Mei and the Anomaly
by WritinginCT
Summary: Mei's all grown up but has never forgotten the father she left behind. When she joins the SGC, her Uncle Jack enlists the most unlikely bodyguard for her- his clone. As the years go by the bond between them grows stronger...
1. Chapter 1

Summary: Mei's all grown up but has never forgotten the father she left behind. When she joins the SGC, her Uncle Jack enlists the most unlikely bodyguard for her- his clone. As the years go by the bond between them grows stronger the closer they get to finding a way back to her father and 'Lantis, but will they allow themselves to be happy along the way?

Pairing: Jonathan O'Neill/OFC, Jack O'Neill/Samantha Carter (canon-ish)  
Warnings: Adult themes, controversial subject matter, torture, attempted rape  
Categories: Drama, family, angst, friendship, romance  
Disclaimer: I don't own the recognizable characters I'm just inspired by them.  
Notes: Sequel to "Mei and Uncle Jack"  
Betas: Special thanks to my fantastic betas kaylashay81, killing_rose, and rocky_no -- you all are the best!

Author's note: This story goes back and forth between time lines. An age/year chart is located at the end of each section for clarification.

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Sheppard settled himself down on the floor of the balcony carefully. His entire body ached and he was beyond exhausted. He tried to make himself comfortable but the raw, itchy spots on his skin made that near impossible. He made do and opened the laptop he had brought with him and powered it up. While it was doing that, he looked out at the beautiful, sunny day that was embracing the city.

A loud voice over the intercom broke his quiet musings to announce, "Self-destruct in twenty-seven minutes."

"'Lantis, can you silence that?" he asked wearily, slipping and using the pet name given to the city by a certain blue-eyed child a long time ago.

_"__Countdown silenced,"_ Atlantis replied in his head.

He turned his attention to the laptop and quickly located the files he wanted. He queued up all of his home movies and let them play as his eyes grew heavier. He registered somewhere in his mind that Atlantis was singing some haunting, ethereal sounding song. The singing was something she normally only did for one person- and that person wasn't him.

Sheppard's eyes finally drooped shut and his breathing was so shallow that his chest barely moved. It was his end, and the end of the city he had so tirelessly defended all these years.

---------------

Sheppard felt a sting in his arm and tried to summon the energy to swat away whatever bug decided to bite him in his last moments. He didn't feel one under his fingers and with an amazing effort, opened his eyes. He blinked in astonishment at the woman kneeling beside him. A woman that couldn't possibly be there because she had died years ago, unless she was acting as some sort of a guide to help him cross to the other side. He reached out a hand and whispered, "Sam?"

Sheppard could see tears freely streaming down her cheeks and she tried to smile for him as she took his hand and said, "No, Daddy. It's me. Mei. And I'm here to take you and 'Lantis home. I'm sorry it took me so long to figure out how to do it."

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_'Lantis - Day 2_

He was resting on an infirmary bed. The medication Mei had injected him with had started to combat the plague ravaging his body. But he was still exhausted and weak. The doctor that Mei had brought with her was pleased with his response though.

The doctor wasn't the only thing pleased. Atlantis was practically beaming. Her Mei had come home. It didn't matter that she had only been gone a few minutes in their reality, the city acted like Mei had been gone a lifetime. It made him wonder again exactly how Atlantis viewed time. It was a question they had never been able to get a straight answer to out of the city.

Sheppard heard someone in boots enter the infirmary and he cracked an eye. He saw a tall, lean man a few years younger than himself in what he guessed were the equivalent of BDU's and hair that was absolutely not regulation with his back to Sheppard talking with the doctor and rubbing his temples. He recognized that headache well. All the natural gene carriers had lived with them for a while until they got used to Atlantis buzzing around in their head.

John offered, "You have to tell Atlantis to tone it down. Otherwise all the aspirin in the world isn't gonna help."

The man turned and said, "Thanks." And gave John a shock. It was Jack O'Neill. But that was impossible. The Jack O'Neill from where Mei had been sent would have to be nearing his eighties. John groaned to himself and wondered if his daughter had been collecting people from random time lines in her efforts to rescue him and Atlantis.

Sheppard's questions were answered a moment later when Mei breezed into the infirmary. Stepping over O'Neill she reached over and gave his bicep a little squeeze and asked, "Headache?"

At his little affirmative nod, Mei sighed and addressed the ceiling, "'Lantis, you have to leave him alone. I know he's confusing you. That's okay. But you have to leave him alone."

Atlantis interrupted Mei and her statement was so forceful that it broadcast to _all_ the gene-carriers on the city, _"Scans show he is the one known as O'Neill, yet if he is O'Neill he is not correct. He is an anomaly. One must study the anomaly." _

O'Neill looked at the ceiling and said, "Hey, I'm not a lab rat, ya know."

John noted that he didn't argue the anomaly part though and that intrigued him. Mei sighed and addressed Atlantis again, "I explained this to you already 'Lantis. He is not the one you know as Jack O'Neill. He is Jonathan O'Neill. And he shares the same genetic makeup as Jack O'Neill because he is in fact Jack O'Neill's Asgard created clone, as I told you before. Now will you please stop pestering him so his headache will go away and we can get started on the work we need to get done to get you and Daddy home to our reality?"

_"Yes. But One will continue to analyze the Anomaly's data to confirm."_

Mei shook her head. "Thank you, 'Lantis."

She gave O'Neill a little grin and a playful little punch on the arm and teased, "See it's all in how you present the information to her."

Sheppard watched their interaction with interest. It was certainly familiar to them. Not romantic, he decided, then amended his thought to _maybe_ not romantic, then he amended that thought again to _possibly_ not romantic, then he added a final amendment that maybe he needed more information before actually making that particular determination. They definitely weren't family-like. This was not her "Uncle Jack" to Mei. It only took a moment more thought when he realized that watching the two of them was a lot like how he and Sam had acted as their friendship had grown after Mei's unexpected arrival, but even closer. They were friends and comrades and he suspected that there was probably a history of watching each other's six out in the thick of things mixed in there as well. He chalked it up to one more weird bond that the Stargate program had created. Even so, Sheppard was extremely curious about this "Asgard created clone" that he'd be willing to bet they didn't have here in this reality, there had to be an interesting story behind that.

O'Neill took a packet of pills from the doctor gratefully and turned to go. Mei approached Sheppard's bed. "Hi Daddy, how are you feeling?"

"Better. The cure you brought with you seems to be working."

Her eyes softened, "It took them three years to synthesize something that would work. The doctors here just didn't have enough time."

Sheppard found himself staring at Mei. He swallowed hard and whispered sadly, "You're all grown up."

She sat beside him on the bed and held his hand in hers. "I know. I'm sorry. Dad and Uncle Jack said this might be a bad idea, Mom was more cautiously optimistic."

"Dad? Mom?"

"The other you and the other Samantha Carter."

"She's alive?"

"Yup. She and Uncle Jack are retired up in Minnesota. Dad's retired too, but they let him stay on his Atlantis."

"So they _did_ raise you?"

Mei smiled. "It was sort of a group effort. When I got there they were still in the middle of the war with the Wraith and I couldn't stay on Atlantis with Dad so I went to live with Uncle Jack in Washington."

"With Sam too?"

Mei shook her head. "No, Mom had just been given command of a new research vessel. And I think my sudden arrival sort of freaked Mom and Dad out a little. Nobody quite knew what to do with me, except Uncle Jack. Between the three of them though, I think I turned out okay."

Sheppard reached up and tucked a strand of hair behind her ear that had escaped her barrette. "You look just like your mom. When you were little you looked more like me. Now... you're beautiful."

She smiled, his smile he noted, and said, "Get some rest, Daddy. I've got to go see how things are going."

---------------

The plan was simple, they were going to utilize the same method that 'Lantis had originally used to send Mei, only on a much larger scale. Construction on the devices needed to make that happen was underway, but it would take several months to complete. It gave Sheppard time to get to know the vibrant woman that his daughter had become. The doctor allowed him out of the infirmary for short periods as he rebuilt his strength and he enjoyed watching her interact with the team she had brought with her. She reminded John so much of Sam that he kept having weird moments of deja vu and expecting Mei to be Sam when she turned around.

Mei was a natural leader, confident and self-assured. Which wasn't particularly surprising given her parents, not to mention having been raised by Jack O'Neill. The others obeyed her orders without question. Well, the others except O'Neill's clone. He seemed to delight in making himself a nuisance and in general just pushing Mei's buttons. And he was good at it.

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_12 years ago -- 2021_

"Uncle Jack, you really didn't have to come with me. I am twenty-two years old and quite capable of managing my first day at the SGC all by myself."

"Yes, but this way I can impress upon General Lorne the very _real_ need to keep you out of trouble."

Actually it wasn't Lorne that he wanted to see. After leaving Mei to fill out reams of paperwork in the personnel office, Jack made his way to a particular lab. He stood quietly in the doorway and watched the man sitting at the bench. He was in BDU's and had on a pair of glasses with magnifying loops as he soldered on a minuscule circuit board. He didn't look up from what he was doing but said flatly, "You forget to order the stealth option on that cane?"

Jack stepped into the room, leaning heavily on the wooden cane that had become his constant companion a couple of years ago. "Ha ha. A piece of advice from me to you. Take care of your knees."

The other man put down the soldering iron and pulled off the glasses and turned to face Jack. And as it had ever other time Jack had interacted with his clone in person, Jack's stomach clenched in some weird combination of revulsion and a sense of danger. A person wasn't meant to come face to face with a thirty-plus year younger version of oneself.

"Her first day?" Jonathan asked without preamble.

"Yeah. She's in the personnel office now."

"Any particular reason why you came with her?"

"Yeah. There is. I wanted to talk to you, face to face. Not over the phone."

The telephone conversation that the two men had shared a month ago had been beyond uncomfortable. But when Jack had finally cut to the chase and asked Jonathan to come work for the SGC to keep Mei safe, Jonathan gave his word without hesitation. He had known that Jack was raising Mei, and he knew the circumstances behind her arrival in their reality and her parentage. And even if he might have thought about telling _Jack_ no, there was not a chance in hell he would ever let anything happen to any kid of Carter's, no matter what reality she had been born in.

Jonathan stood up and stepped over to Jack and said, "Okay, we're face to face. Talk."

Jack's expression was stony and he said in a deadly serious tone, "I want your word that you'll keep her safe."

"I gave it to you already. Do I really need to say it again?"

"Yes."

"I'll keep her out of trouble. And, yes, I'll keep her safe. You have my word."

Jack's expression turned into a smirk. And Jonathan was annoyed. "What's so funny?"

"Oh, nothing. I have to warn you though; you might be able to keep her safe, but you will never, _ever_ be able to keep her out of trouble."

"Oh, really."

"Yeah. Picture a combination of Sam and Daniel at their geeky best but with a reckless, fearless streak that puts you and I, and even Teal'c to shame. She's gonna keep you hopping." Jack turned to go and teased from the doorway, "I hope your knees are up for it 'cause I'm going to hold you to your word."

---------------

Mei was in the conference room with Lorne and Jack. She was beaming at the General and talking animatedly when Jonathan quietly entered the room. He watched from the doorway for a moment, this being his first time actually seeing an adult Mei, the file he had read on her only had a picture of her when she had first arrived on Atlantis as a child. She was _definitely_ not a child any more. As he stepped into the room, the three of them turned to face him and he watched the shock then understanding cross Mei's face as she recognized him. She stood up and walked over to him.

With a little wonder and awe in her voice she said, "Wow. I mean, hi. I'm Mei." She extended her hand. Mei had spent the past dozen years learning to treat people that wore familiar faces from her original reality as entirely separate individuals. Jonathan was no different. He might look like her Uncle Jack, and the two men shared some memories, but he was completely his own person in her mind.

Jonathan's mouth had become a desert. She looked just like Carter. Sounded just like Carter. There was something about her reserved little smile that was someone else, but overall she was Carter. And as he shook her extended hand he had a weird sense of deja vu as he recalled meeting a certain brass young Captain in this very room a lifetime ago, albeit someone else's lifetime.

"Jonathan O'Neill," he finally managed to get out.

There was a devilish twinkle in Mei's eyes as she teased, "I'm willing to bet pizza and a six pack that you're the lucky guy that Uncle Jack has roped into being my new babysitter."

He realized in that instant that she wasn't Carter. Sam was never quite that bold or maybe just not that comfortably uninhibited. But even as that thought registered in his mind, the wide smile she gave him _was_ all Carter and he knew in that moment that he was done for.

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_'Lantis -- Day 8_

John didn't find Mei among the engineers working on the device and queried Atlantis as to her whereabouts.

_"Mei and the Anomaly are on the south pier,"_ was the city's reply.

John chuckled at the city's persistent name for O'Neill and headed for the pier. At the doorway to go outside, John could see Mei and O'Neill on the pier, sitting side by side with their feet hanging over the edge, O'Neill with a fishing pole in hand. John was about to go out when he saw O'Neill put the pole down and put an arm around Mei. A moment later John could see Mei's shoulders start shaking and he realized she was crying. He was about to burst out of the door when he watched O'Neill pull Mei into a tight hug. He watched as O'Neill held her and rubbed her back and he could see O'Neill's mouth moving, trying to soothe her and he also saw the way that Mei just melted into O'Neill.

John was thoroughly confused. He asked Atlantis, "'Lantis, why is Mei crying?" He knew the city would have already queried Mei herself.

_"One was told it is because she is not as you remember and she feels your sadness."_

John frowned. He had been trying to keep that from Mei.

_"Sheppard?"_ the city queried.

"Yes, Atlantis?" John absently replied as he continued to watch Mei and O'Neill.

_"Is the Anomaly to be trusted?"_

John saw O'Neill keep Mei in a one-armed hug as he fished a bandanna out of his pocket and handed it to her to blow her nose on. "Yes, Atlantis. He can be trusted. The same as you would trust any of the rest of us."

_"Incorrect context. Rewording query. Is the Anomaly to be trusted with Mei?"_

John blinked for a moment. Was Atlantis really concerned about O'Neill's _intentions_? He watched Mei undo and redo her hair in her barrette as O'Neill picked his fishing pole back up. O'Neill cast the line and Mei sat there, resting her head on his shoulder. When O'Neill leaned his head towards Mei's, John had his answer, "Yes, Atlantis. He can be trusted with our Mei."

John turned and slowly walked back to his quarters, wanting some time alone with his thoughts.

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_11 years ago - 2022_

"Why do you play dumb?" Mei asked with a raised eyebrow.

Jonathan looked over at her from where she was standing on the opposite side of a set of prison bars. He gave her a flat glare then returned his attention to the open control panel in front of him as he tried to find the right circuit that would open the door to her cell.

"I mean, I know you have advanced degrees in Electrical Engineering and Metallurgy. And those are just your own. You also have knowledge from... you know... before. So why play dumb all the time?"

A little zap hit his thumb and he jumped back and gritted out, "In a minute I swear I'm gonna leave you in there if you don't stop distracting me."

"No, you won't. Dad and Uncle Jack wouldn't like that a lot and I won't even mention Mom." She gave him a cheesy smile through the bars.

He sighed and turned back to the wiring. It only took him a few more seconds to find the right circuit and with a little pop of electricity the door to her cell slid open.

"My hero," she teased as she walked past him and patted his stomach. Jonathan closed his eyes and let out a breath, she _was_ going to be the death of him. Turning his ball cap back around, he quickly followed her back out of the abandoned prison she had managed to get herself locked into and to the gate and home.

---------------

Three days later there was a knock on the door to Jonathan's apartment. He opened it to see Mei standing there with a pizza in one hand and a six pack of his favorite beer in the other. She seemed a little unsure of herself, something very uncharacteristic for her, and he wondered what was up.

He stood aside and she walked in and he noticed the heavy knapsack on her back. She put the pizza and beer on the table and slipped out of the knapsack's straps. Her voice was small as she asked with a look of near desperation on her face, "Will you help me?"

"Help you with what? You're making me a little... concerned here, Mei. What's going on?"

She pulled a thick stack of notebooks and loose sheets of paper that were full of equations out of the knapsack and held them out to him. There was an old pain in her eyes as she pleaded, "You have to help me go back for my father."

Hours later, when Mei was sound asleep on his couch under a blanket, Jonathan re-read her theory. He sighed and pulled an empty notepad towards him and began his own analysis. As he went through all of her notes again, he opened an old black and white composition book and was surprised to see a child's handwriting. It meant that she must have started working on all this when she first arrived in this reality. He looked over at her sleeping form and realized that she had been carrying the weight of this for almost thirteen years. Thirteen _years_. He wondered if her "Uncle Jack" knew.

His expression turned to worry as he looked at her. This was bordering on obsessive. And he wondered if it were responsible for her limited number of close friends and her lack of any semblance of a social or romantic life. He bit back a laugh at that though; he really wasn't one to talk. His own social and romantic life was a hairsbreadth away from being non-existent.

He got up and grabbed another beer out of the fridge and made a quick stop in the living room to pull the blanket up a little where it had slipped off Mei then sat back down and began to brainstorm.

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_'Lantis -- Day 13_

Mei was diligently making sandwiches and heating up some soup for the team's lunch, they were all taking turns cooking and cleaning up. John was leaning up against the counter watching her work. He reached over and stole a slice of cheese and said, "First date."

Mei blushed and chuckled. Her father was trying to catch up on the past twenty-five years of her life by playing twenty questions. She thought for a minute and replied, "Dennis Fitzgerald. I was fifteen and he was the captain of our hockey team. We went to see some supposedly cool space movie. We only went out once."

There was something in her tone letting him know that the date had been a disaster. He teased lightly, "You picked apart the science didn't you?"

"Maybe. How did you know?"

John chuckled. "There was an unwritten rule around here that none of us would watch science fiction movies with your mother for that exact reason."

Mei laughed and said, "Mom... I mean the other Sam and I'll go to the movies sometimes, just the two of us, so we can pick things apart to our hearts' content. Next question."

John cocked his head to one side and asked gently, "Last date?"

Mei chewed on her bottom lip for a moment then answered, "I should have known that one was coming. Um, so let's see, last date. Last _real_ date I'm assuming you mean and not just beers after a mission. Hmmm, that would be four years ago. A blind date with the brother of one of the Marines I worked with regularly. Let's just say it didn't go well."

Her voice was a little dejected and it cut into him. "Four years is a long time ago, there really hasn't been anyone since then?"

Mei stirred the soup slowly, her back to John. Her reply was soft. "Dating just doesn't seem to work out so well for me, Daddy. I don't know. I think sometimes I'm just too weird for most people. The only person that gets me is Jonathan. And that's because he's equally weird in his own way."

There was something in her tone that let him know she was holding something important back about that, and without even knowing she gave John the perfect segue to the topic he really wanted to talk to her about. "So you two?"

She turned around and he noticed a little sadness in her eyes. "That's very, _very_ complicated, Daddy. The only way Uncle Jack and Dad would let me go off world was if there was someone _they_ could trust to watch my six. Uncle Jack figured that if it couldn't be him then Jonathan was the next best thing. So they pulled him in out of the aerospace firm he was designing and test piloting for and stuck him with me. That was twelve years ago. We've been through a lot since then, personally and professionally. And we're very... close. But there aren't any utopian visions of two point two children and a house with a white picket fence in our future if that's what you're asking."

There was a wistfulness in her voice that she couldn't hide and John suspected there was quite a bit of significant history and maybe even a deep sliver of old pain there that she wasn't sharing and said gently, "It kinda sounds like you might want there to be, Mei."

"What I might or might not want is a moot point, Daddy. You have to understand. When Jonathan woke up thirty years ago he thought he _was_ Jack O'Neill. He had all the same memories, feelings, and mannerisms, everything, only in a teenager's body. When it was all sorted out and they found out he was actually a clone he had to try and make some kind of a new life for himself. But even though he walked away from everything and everybody he ever knew to do that, those memories and feelings were still there inside him. And let's just say that even after all the years he's known me, sometimes when he looks at me, it's not me that he sees...."

"Who do you think it is?"

"Mom."

"Ahh."

"Yeah. So like I said, moot point." She handed him the plates of sandwiches and turned to pick up the soup pot.

John turned to walk towards the dining area trying to process what she had just revealed, then paused. He asked lightly, "Mei, who do _you_ see when you look at him?

Mei looked back at him over her shoulder and he could see the grin on her face as she answered simply with a little shrug, "Jonathan."

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_10 years ago -- 2023_

"Ahh, this is a great way to spend a rainy afternoon," Jonathan teased as he slid down deeper into the padded seat and waited for the show to start.

Mei was beside him and not quite as enthused. "I could be working in the lab, ya know."

Jonathan held up a finger to emphasize and said, "Nope. Remember our deal. You have to take one day off a week and do something fun."

She sighed. He had extracted that promise out of her a year ago when he agreed to help her find a way back to her father. Truth be told, the things he dragged her off to were fun and her stress level felt more manageable than it had been in years.

Jonathan was absently picking at the armrest separating them and asked, "Mei, can I ask you something?"

"Um, yeah, sure."

"Do you ever get me confused with... him?"

She smiled and said without hesitation, "No. Never. Sometimes on the phone it might take me a second but I can always tell you two apart. Why?"

His brow furrowed and his voice was a little sad as he said, "Sometimes it seems like you're the only person at the SGC that doesn't look at me and see him."

She reached over and gave his forearm a little squeeze. "Yeah, I know. I'm sorry."

"You've always just accepted me for myself. How come?"

Mei nestled herself down into her seat a little then replied, "When I first got here everyone looked just like people I knew. And I kept expecting them to know me and act like the people I had I had known before. But it didn't work. Uncle Jack was the one to finally explain things to me and after that I had to train myself to not automatically associate faces with familiarity. Everyone I met was a whole new person, even if I had known them well before. So when Uncle Jack explained about you and we finally met, it just didn't faze me. You are your own person, Jonathan. It's that simple."

"That simple huh? So why the "wow" when you introduced yourself?"

She elbowed him playfully and he saw a little blush cross her cheeks. She teased, "You have _looked_ in a mirror lately right? I absolutely refuse to stroke your ego by telling you that, you know, you're a very handsome guy. But I will say that I know of at least five women tripping over themselves to get your attention at the SGC."

He elbowed her back and teased, "You one of the five?"

As the lights dropped and a brilliant star field filled the dome of the planetarium he heard her reply quietly with a little giggle, "Nah, I've already got your attention."

---------------

Six months later Jonathan was settling in to watch a hockey game and was contemplating ordering some Chinese when there was a knock on the door. Mei. And she was carrying a paper bag from the liquor store. She made herself at home and put the beer from the bag in the fridge and opened a kitchen cabinet and grabbed a couple of shot glasses for the bottle of tequila that the bag had also contained.

There was something in her eyes that let him know she wasn't quite her normal self. So he asked lightly, "Chinese work for you?"

She nodded as she grabbed the cutting board and sliced up a lemon.

In short order they were watching hockey and had a couple of shots of tequila in them. Mei seemed to be on a mission to get obliviously drunk and not talk. So he let her. Their food arrived and he was glad to see her eat at least a little, it would absorb some of the alcohol.

Throughout the evening the number of empty beer bottles on the coffee table grew and the amount of tequila left in the bottle went down. Finally Jonathan asked, "You gonna tell me what's wrong?"

She looked incredibly small and somehow fragile sitting there tucked into the corner of his couch, and her voice matched her outward appearance when she said, "You know how they say you never hear anything nice about yourself when you eavesdrop? Well I found out today that a bunch of the guys on base seem to think I'm, to quote one, a "cold fish" that has the personality of a walking computer. And to quote another one, it doesn't pay to wonder what base anyone would get to with me because it's obvious that I don't play ball and that just maybe I'd loosen up if I did."

Jonathan sat up and said angrily, "Who the hell said that? And I want names, Mei." There were significant lessons in manners owed to at least two, and Jonathan was more than happy to oblige.

"It doesn't matter. 'Cause when I thought about it I realized they were right, at least outwardly."

"The hell they are. And yes, it does matter."

"Jonathan, I've turned down every guy that's asked me out since I was about seventeen. You know I gave up once I figured out that dating just... sucks. And I _am_ a walking computer."

"Mei, you are one of the smartest and funniest people I've _ever_ known. And you're beautiful, you know that, you don't need me to tell you that. Don't let a few jerks at the base fill your head with stuff that's just not true. None of them deserve you anyway."

Her eyes held his for a long moment before she capitulated with a drunken shrug.

Jonathan was still seething with anger as they settled back down to finish watching the game. Mei poured two more shots that led to the rest of the bottle being consumed.

---------------

Jonathan woke and carefully cracked open an eye. The little bit of light in his bedroom felt like an ice pick to the brain. He swore off tequila for the umpteenth time in his or anyone else's memory and tried to stumble to the bathroom to take care of nature's call. His memory of the rest of the evening after he and Mei's little heart to heart was spotty. He found the aspirin in the medicine cabinet and had a flash of kissing Mei. He drank right from the bathroom faucet and tried to recall more. He had more flashes of them laughing and in various stages of undress. And he had a flash of them in his bed, making love. Then... nothing.

He stared down at his rumpled bed, evidence that the flashes weren't just something his tequila-fueled brain had dreamt up. He noticed something else and it made his stomach churn from the implication even as another flash of memory confirmed it. As his stomach won the battle and he was hanging over the toilet he wondered why Mei had left. And he also prayed that their drunken indiscretion wouldn't come between them.

---------------

He found Mei in her lab on base. She looked about as hung over as he was. "Hi." he said quietly.

He noticed she wouldn't really meet his eyes and her reply was weak, 'Hi."

"How's your head?"

"Probably about as good as yours." Her tone was a little icy.

He fiddled with something on the bench to keep his hands occupied and said, "I woke up and you were gone."

She took a deep breath and let it out as she said, "Yeah."

Jonathan was getting a little annoyed at her demeanor and his own temper surfaced a bit. "Last night shouldn't have happened."

She met his eyes fully for the first time and he could see that she had been crying. There was a little defiant tilt to her chin and she replied, "You're right, it shouldn't have."

"Look, most of the night after you told me about what those guys said is missing up here," he tapped his temples then continued, "But I think we just had way too much to drink and some lines were crossed. It shouldn't have happened."

He was waiting for her to say something of substance, something that would give him some sort of clue as to why she was giving him the cold shoulder. She didn't. "I just agreed with you. But let me repeat myself. You're right, it shouldn't have happened. So we'll just forget it ever did and move on."

His irritation flared, "Damn it, Mei. I saw the bed. Your first time shouldn't have been on the tail end of some tequila bender. And it sure as hell shouldn't have been with someone as old as me, mentally _or_ physically. It should have been with someone your own age. Somebody you really cared about."

She went to walk out of the room, but his hand wrapped around her bicep in a heartbeat. Her back was towards him and her voice was low and full of pain and he knew she was trying not to cry as she said, "For your information, it _was_ with someone I really care about."

"So why did you leave? And why are you so upset? Did I hurt you?"

"No, you didn't hurt me. Not the way you mean anyway. _ That_ part was great. Now please just let me go."

His tone was that calm, deadly serious one that brooked no nonsense from anyone as he asked, "Please tell me what I did."

If she had turned around and sucker punched him he would have been less shocked then what her four simple words did to him, "You called me Sam."

His hand opened of its own accord and she walked out of the room without another word or a backwards glance.

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_'Lantis -- Day 32_

They had been on the city a month. The progress on the device was right on schedule. Not that the schedule mattered much. When they finally returned home to their time and reality, it would be within an hour of their original departure.

Jonathan tied his sneakers and stretched before setting off on his morning run. He was surprised when John joined him part way. Jonathan slowed his pace a bit, not out of any sort of deference to the other man's age, but rather because he knew that John was still regaining his strength and though he was almost back to his normal self, there was no need to push it.

They paused and caught a breath on a far pier. John huffed out, "You know when I first saw you I thought Mei had been jumping around in different time lines or something and recruiting people."

Jonathan chuckled and mopped his face. "Don't give her any ideas."

"Hey, don't take this the wrong way or anything, but I did some digging and I didn't find any record of a version of you in this reality."

"Yeah. Mei checked that right away too. Looks like I'm unique. But then again, we didn't have a Mei in ours so maybe she and I cancel each other out."

John met Jonathan's eyes and said, "I don't really know what to say to you."

"I get that a lot."

John held up a hand. "I didn't mean it like that. It's just... well... technically you've known my daughter longer than I have. And you _know_ her... as an adult I mean. It's just... she went and grew up and somehow turned into this strong, capable woman that I keep expecting to be Sam when she turns around. And I'm not dealing real well with that."

Jonathan's eyes softened. He felt for the other man. "Yeah. That I get. It took me a little while after I met her to not see Carter," Jonathan dropped his eyes to the floor and continued in a tone tinged with regret, "We had some... bumps in the road because of it. But I think she's forgiven me for the most part." Jonathan looked up, his expression masking any emotions and added, "Mei is _the_ most dedicated person I've ever met. She has spent every spare minute of the past twenty-five years trying to figure out how to get you home. She's worked harder than a dozen people and sacrificed a lot, more than most people will ever know, to make this happen."

John contemplated that for a moment and said thoughtfully, "I'm starting to sense that. And I'm also starting to think she wasn't the only one."

There was something about John's expression that made Jonathan feel like a butterfly pinned to a board.

---------------------------------------------  
_9 years ago -- 2024_

Jonathan tried to go for casual as he stepped in Mei's lab. In the seven months since their disastrous drunken night, he had avoided her lab like the plague. Their formerly close personal relationship had de-evolved into a strictly professional one.

"Hey," he said lightly as he entered the room, "I just got your message."

"Yeah. I'm doing a little schedule shuffling. Dad's coming in for a week and wants me to head out to San Diego with him. I guess some guy he went to college with's son is getting married and he asked me to tag along."

"You haven't seen him in a while, so that'll be good." He rocked back on his heels and she nodded in agreement.

"Yep. Not so keen on the whole wedding where I don't know anyone thing, but that's only one day. Dad said he intends to be parked on the beach for the rest of it. And that I can totally get behind."

"So are they sticking us with a temporary until you get back or are we on stand down?"

"A little of both. Sanders wants to take a few days off as well. But one of the other teams offered you a mission spot if you're interested."

"Which mission?"

"The detailed mineral and topographical survey of Mini-Minnesota."

They had playfully named the small moon Mini-Minnesota after their first mission there last year. It was lushly wooded with countless small lakes and streams that were teeming with fish. Jonathan had been in his fishing-loving glory and had been dying for the opportunity to go back.

With a smirk he asked, "You did tell them yes for me, right?"

The playful little grin she flashed back was one he hadn't seen in very long time and she replied, "Don't forget to pack your bug spray."

He turned to go, wanting to leave before the friendly atmosphere had the opportunity to turn cold. He had just reached the doorway when she called out to him, "Jonathan?"

He turned, his hand on the doorjamb and said, "Yeah?"

With an almost nervous little smile she replied, "Have fun."

He slapped the door jam lightly and said with a grin, "You too, Mei."

As he headed down the corridor with a spring in his step that hadn't been seen in quite a while, Jonathan was optimistic that maybe, just maybe, he and Mei were going to be okay. And he hoped so. He missed her, more than he ever expected to.

---------------

John had splurged on a posh hotel right on the beach for himself and Mei. He flipped his dog tags over his shoulder to hang down the back and settled down into a beach chair in the sun with a cold beer, a new golf magazine, and an audible sigh of contentment. Mei shook her head and laughed and teased her father, "Dad, you always act like you've never seen the beach before."

Mei was getting a kick out of the appreciative looks her father was getting from women of all ages. Even at fifty-seven, he had women tripping over themselves and he was still oblivious to them all. Or at least pretended to be.

Mei had just settled in with a physics journal she had brought to read when her attention was pulled away from it by the unexpected arrival of a volleyball in the sand next to her. She picked it up and looked around for its owner. A moment later a buff, tan man about her age walked up with a grin. He had dirty blond hair that was cut short, Hawaiian print swim trunks in day-glo orange, and dog tags around his neck. He teased as she tossed him the ball, "I couldn't have aimed that better if I had tried. But then again I did try so I guess maybe I'm just good."

John snorted behind his magazine and Mei's cheeks flushed red and she chided, "Not a word, Dad."

She turned back towards their visitor and teased back, "Don't get too cocky. If your trajectory had been just a little off, you might have hit the general's beer instead."

The young man's eyes grew wide and he looked towards John and catching sight of the ball chain around John's neck, straightened his posture automatically.

John dropped the magazine in his lap and said to Mei, "That was mean." He addressed the man and extended his hand, "Relax, son. I'm on vacation. General John Sheppard, Air Force. And this is my daughter Mei."

He visibly relaxed and shook John's hand and introduced himself, "Lieutenant Christopher Burton, sir, Navy. Very pleased to meet you, sir. And you, Ms. Sheppard."

John picked up his magazine and started leafing through it again and said casually, "Feel free to ignore me, Lieutenant. You can recommence flirting with my daughter whenever you're ready."

After an awkward moment and an equally awkward invite to go play volleyball, John watched Mei walk away with Burton. He had to bite back a chuckle when he heard Burton ask, "So do you always read physics journals for fun?"

And when Mei nodded and shrugged in affirmation, Burton surprised both Mei and John when he said, "Cool. Me too. Dr. Martinson's article on page seventy-nine is fantastic, have you gotten to it yet?"

---------------

A week later Mei was in her lab, looking relaxed and sun-kissed. Jonathan stuck his head in her lab to say hi. He was equally relaxed; the mission itself had been a cakewalk and the after-hours fishing a much needed break.

The mood in the room was light and they were chit-chatting almost like old times when a respectful knock at the door to the lab got their attention. An airman was there carrying an enormous arrangement of roses and lilies. Mei looked questioningly at Jonathan and he held up his hands and said, "Don't look at me."

She found the card and read it with a grin. They were from Christopher.

After their initial beach encounter it turned out that they were attending the same wedding the next day. Christopher was the son of a Navy rear admiral that was the godfather of the bride. He was also a Navy engineer working on missile targeting system design and had graduated from MIT. And he was, for lack of a better word, smitten by Mei. They spent the entire wedding reception practically hip to hip, and they talked about everything and anything that came to mind. And there were more than a few comments whispered about what a handsome couple they made as they danced. When John stole his daughter away for a dance the smile on Mei's face was all Sam as she conspiratorially whispered that Christopher hadn't thought it was weird that when he came back from getting them fresh drinks that she was scratching down an equation on a napkin, he had just chuckled and pulled a small notepad half-full of his own scratched down notes out of his breast pocket and tore off a few sheets for her. Later on, John made a point of introducing himself to Admiral Burton, sensing that the younger Burton just might be making future appearances in his daughter's life. And sure enough, Christopher spent a goodly amount of time with Mei during the duration of their stay in San Diego.

Mei stuck her nose in one of the roses and inhaled.

Jonathan watched her intently. Mei wasn't someone that could hide her emotions. And he could see the thrill the flowers had given her on her face. It was plain as day for anyone that knew her. Or at least to him.

He asked lightly, "You make a new friend in San Diego?"

She shrugged and said, "Yeah. He's a Navy Lieutenant, an engineer."

Her eyes met his over the flowers. He could see the question in them and he knew that there were only two ways he could play this, the truth or a lie. The truth would hurt them both and most likely leave both of them miserable in the end. The lie would be easier, at least at first, and better for Mei, but it would be one he'd have to live with for the rest of their lives.

"You should call him and tell him you like the flowers."

His quiet response wasn't what she expected and like every other emotion, it showed on her face. He gave her a gentle smile as he turned to leave the lab.

He had gone with the lie. And it wasn't the first time in his mind that he denied having deeper feelings for a brilliant blonde that he felt he couldn't have.

---------------------------------------------  
_'Lantis -- Day 40_

_"You have no offspring?"_ was the city's query out of the blue in his head. He paused in his sorting out of the wiring that needed to be reworked to get the city home.

"What?" was Jonathan's short reply. The city had taken to asking him odd questions here and there, often at the most inconvenient times.

_"You have not reproduced?"_

Even as a flash of Charlie's face filled his mind he answered, "No. I don't have any kids."

_"Mei has informed One that you do, in fact, enjoy children."_

He sighed; it was going to be one of _those_ conversations with the city. It was as if she was trying to get in his head and figure out how he ticked. If John was her favorite, and Mei her baby, then Jonathan was the city's shiny new toy.

"Yeah, I like kids. And they like me. I just haven't had any."

_"One has analyzed your genetic code. You and O'Neill are classified with Sheppard."_

"You mean we all have a strong Ancient gene?"

_"Affirmative. One would request that you sire offspring and pass on the needed trait so One will not be alone in a future time."_

"It's not that simple, Atlantis."

_"Problem. Solution. One wanted offspring. One created offspring. You are able to do the same. It is not a complex problem."_

Jonathan laughed. "Well, for us it's a little more complicated."

_"Are you unfamiliar with the mechanics of biological reproduction? One can instruct."_

Jonathan hit his radio and whined, "Mei, make her stop."

---------------

John found Mei sitting cross-legged in the middle of her bed. The room was obviously still that of a child and Mei looked around at her childhood things haphazardly lying around fondly.

John sat next to her and teased, "Still a slob?"

"Of course. Why do you think I never joined the military? I would never have survived basic training."

He chuckled then changed the subject, "Has Atlantis been a little quiet to you the last couple days?"

She dropped her head and laughed hard, "No, Daddy. She's just preoccupied with driving Jonathan absolutely crazy."

"What do you mean?"

"She's just pestering him about life, the universe, and everything."

_"That is an inaccurate assessment. The Anomaly has limited knowledge of the universe. One's queries to the Anomaly are valid to the gathering of personal information for analysis."_

Mei looked up and said with a shake of her head, "The Anomaly has a _name_, 'Lantis."

---------------

"_Sheppard_?"

John looked up from the tablet computer he was reading from and answered, "Yes, Atlantis?"

_"One is confused."_

"About what?"

_"Mei and the Anomaly."_

"What about them?"

_"One does not understand why they have not reproduced. Both are physically healthy and in the prime of their reproductive years. Yet neither will confirm plans for potential reproduction."_

"We talked about this a long time ago, Atlantis. There are a lot of factors that go into humans reproducing. And we've explained to you that there is more involved than just biology. People can choose when they want to have a baby, or not have babies at all."

_"One desires Mei to reproduce. One wishes to interact with her offspring."_

John grimaced. He had a flash of envy of the other Sheppard in not having to deal with a sentient city. And a sentient city that apparently had designs on becoming a grandmother.

"Atlantis, I'm still trying to get used to her being all grown up. Let's not rush grandchildren."

---------------------------------------------  
tbc...

_Age table for those interested:_

Mei

2008- 09 (Mei arrived in this reality)  
2021- 22 (Mei & Jonathan meet)  
2033- 34 (Mission to go to other reality)  
2037- 38 (Epilogue)

Jonathan (physical age)

2003- 15 (Jonathan created by Loki)  
2021- 33 (Mei & Jonathan meet)  
2033- 45 (Mission to go to other reality)  
2037- 49 (Epilogue)

Jack  
2003- 51 (Jonathan created by Loki)  
2008- 56 (Mei arrived in this reality)  
2021- 69 (Mei & Jonathan meet)  
2033- 81 (Mission to go to other reality)  
2037- 85 (Epilogue)

Sam/John (this reality)  
2008- 41 (Mei arrived in this reality)  
2021- 54 (Mei & Jonathan meet)  
2033- 66 (Mission to go to other reality)  
2037- 70 (Epilogue)

Sam/John (alternate reality)  
2010- 43 (Mei born)  
2014- 47 (Sam dies)  
2019- 52 (Mei sent away, arrival of 2033 mission)  
2037- 56 (Epilogue)

Laura Cadman (this reality)**  
2008- 27 (Mei arrived in this reality)  
2037- 56 (Epilogue)  
**I am basing her age on personal opinion  
given her appearance and rank in "Duet"

This was the storyline I had originally envisioned when I wrote "Mei and Uncle Jack". My idea at first had been to have a fully adult Mei arrive unexpectedly on Atlantis, but then I hit on the idea of her as a child and ran with it instead. When I started thinking about a sequel to "Mei and Uncle Jack" I kept coming back to the original idea of a Carter look-a-like and how Jack (and ergo his clone) totally has a "type" (ie Sara, Sam, Weir v1.0). So here it is. Almost 30,000 words of a fic that I wasn't going to, but found that I couldn't _not_ write ^.^ Special thanks to my fantastic betas kaylashay81, killing_rose, and rocky_no -- you all are the best!

~CJ


	2. Chapter 2

Note: This story goes back and forth between time lines. An age/year chart is located at the end of each section for clarification.

---------------------------------------------  
_8 years ago -- 2025_

Sam was leaning a hip against the counter in Mei's apartment, watching Mei adding seemingly random things to the stir-fry she was cooking. She reached over and stole a pepper from the cutting board and asked, "So you think he's finally going to propose?"

Mei shrugged, "Probably. He's been hinting at it pretty hard lately. And don't forget the boys' little meeting last month."

She and Christopher had been seeing each other for just about a year. The long distance relationship was work, but they made the most of it. He was currently stationed at Norfolk in Virginia and Mei was flying out the next day to meet him for a week of vacation. A month ago he had made a surprise weekend trip to Colorado just to go and have dinner with her father and her Uncle Jack, who both came in all the way from Pegasus and Minnesota respectively. Christopher wouldn't tell her what it was all about, but she suspected they had discussed his intentions to propose. Everyone was expecting her to come back from the Virginia trip engaged. Everyone except Mei that is.

Sam picked up on something not quite right with Mei's tone and said, "You don't sound too excited."

Mei asked quietly, "Can I tell you something, Mom? Just between us?"

"Yeah, absolutely. What is it?"

"I'm going to say no if he asks."

"Why? I thought you both were happy."

"This is really going to sound selfish, but the long distance thing _works_ for me. It's nice having someone out there for me, but I don't think I'm up for trying to be in a relationship where we're together all the time. I like being able to not have to worry about it if I want to spend an extra few hours in the lab. Or if some extended off world project comes up and I need to be gone for weeks at a time. And I'm just not ready to give up the SGC to stay home and have babies and dinner parties."

Sam reached over and stroked Mei's hair, and said gently, "I know. There's never an easy balance. When you first arrived here and we were trying to figure out who was going to take you, your dad and I had a talk and I think what he said to me then sort of applies here. He said, "That's not selfish, it's honest." And that's all you can be, Mei. It might hurt both of you at first, but it will save heartache later on. Better to get that all out in the open now, rather than later on after you're already married."

Mei didn't say anything, but nodded thoughtfully.

Sam regarded her daughter for a moment and prodded, "Do you love Christopher?"

Mei's eyes were wide as she stared back at her mother, but she didn't answer.

The telephone ringing gave her a respite in having to answer. Sam watched as Mei's face went ashen and she told the person on the other end, "I'll be there in ten minutes."

Mei hung up the phone and turned the burner off underneath the wok. "I have to get to the mountain."

Sam grabbed her own jacket as Mei pulled on a sweatshirt far too big to be her own and asked. "What's going on?"

"There's been an incident, Jonathan's missing."

---------------

Jonathan groaned and tried to draw in a breath. That was a mistake and his cracked ribs let him know so. He looked around carefully, trying to assess the situation. He was in some sort of makeshift cell. One of the rebels that had blown up the aeronautics lab where he and his team had been working with scientists from the planet's legitimate government opened the door to Jonathan's cell and asked with a sneer, "Are you ready to talk?"

Never being able to say no to an opportunity for sarcasm, Jonathan replied, "You know, now's really not a good time. Maybe we could reschedule this round of torture for next week. Say Tuesday?"

---------------

It took five days to find him. Five days of Mei screaming to be heard that he wasn't dead no matter what the evidence might have otherwise indicated. The only person that believed Mei was Sam. Oddly, no one even questioned _her_ presence at the temporary staging area near the gate the SGC had set up for the investigation. Even retired, she was after all, Samantha Carter.

And when Mei said with a defiant tilt to her chin that Sam knew all too well, "He's not dead. I'd know if he were dead," Sam had all the answers she needed about Mei and Christopher and where Mei's true feelings fell.

When the rebel camp was finally found, Jonathan was in bad shape. When the Marines brought him on a stretcher to the staging area, Sam was the first one to his side. His eyes were nearly swollen shut from repeated beatings, and his mouth and lips parched from a lack of water. He somehow roused to consciousness though, and with a tremendous effort lifted his hand towards Sam and in a croaked whisper said, "Mei..." before the blackness overtook him again. Sam looked behind her but didn't see Mei, and it took her a moment to realize that Jonathan thought _she_ was Mei and her mind couldn't help but flash back to being stuck under the ice with a dying Jack who called her Sara.

---------------

He was in a coma for six days. And Mei refused to leave his side. In the dim light of the infirmary the third night Mei started to shatter. Worry and no sleep had pushed her to her brink. Silent tears streamed down her cheeks as she sat close to his bed, stroking his hand just as she had since they found him.

A gentle hand on her head made her jump, she hadn't heard anyone behind her. She turned to see the one person that might be able to make her somehow believe that Jonathan would be okay: Jack. She stood and allowed herself to be enveloped in a strong embrace. Her silent tears turned into sobs as Jack held her. Her fist weakly thumped on Jack's chest as she pleaded, "He can't die on me, Uncle Jack. Not like this. Not like this."

Jack rubbed her back and tried to comfort her, "He's tough. You just have to give him some time."

When she had finally cried herself out, Jack managed to convince her to crawl up into the empty bed next to Jonathan's and get some sleep. He took her place in the chair near the bed. He contemplated Mei's emotional outburst and wondered what it meant exactly. He knew they were close, as teammates and friends. But that wasn't what he had heard in Mei's voice. Jack forced himself to look at the situation objectively and came to a startling observation. Looking at Mei as a woman, and not as the adopted niece he had raised, he realized that she fell into the category of being completely his, and ergo Jonathan's, "type". Sara, Sam, and Mei, they were all smart and independent, as well as blonde and beautiful. And in a bizarre mirror of he and Sam, Mei and Jonathan's physical age differences were about the same. Jack hadn't even considered any of that when he had dropped Mei into Jonathan's care almost five years ago. Now he wondered if it were a problem. And where exactly did Christopher fit into this puzzle? The young man had planned on proposing but Jack knew at the moment Mei wasn't even returning his calls.

After a while he stood and stretched and pulled the blanket up a little on Mei. He stepped over to Jonathan's bed and regarded the battered man lying there. He leaned in and whispered, "I don't know what's going on between you two, but don't you dare die on her. You hear me?"

---------------

Mei was trying to sort through her backlog of paperwork as she sat next to Jonathan's bed. She had finally been convinced to shower and change and she had on her BDU pants with the big baggy sweatshirt she had left in her locker when she had hit the locker room to change before heading off world to help in the search the fateful night they got the call about Jonathan. It was actually Jonathan's sweatshirt that Mei had pinched out of his truck one night after they had gone to a hockey game. She was shuffling file folders around when a hoarse voice teased her, "I wondered where that sweatshirt went."

She looked over and saw familiar brown eyes looking at her from amidst fading bruises. She dropped the folders back down on the little bedside table she had commandeered before she closed her own eyes for a moment and sent up a silent prayer of thanksgiving. A single tear of relief snuck out on her. She opened her eyes again when she felt his thumb clumsily wipe it away as he chided, "No crying."

She put her hand over his and pressed her cheek into his palm and let out a shuddering breath. "No crying."

---------------

A week later Jonathan maneuvered his crutches around and fell blissfully back into Mei's couch and eased his wrapped ankle up onto the coffee table. "Why can't I go home to my apartment?"

Mei was in the kitchen putting away the bag of groceries and replied, "Because you live on the fourth floor in a building with no elevator."

"Good point. You sure you don't mind me staying here?"

"Oh, please."

She made them dinner and he asked lightly, "Christopher isn't gonna have a problem with this is he?"

Mei took a big sip of wine and replied a little stiffly, "Doesn't matter if he does."

Jonathan raised an eyebrow. "Oh?"

Mei chewed another bite of pasta and swallowed before answering, "He and I are... taking a break."

"How long of a break?"

"A permanent one." Her tone let him know she didn't want to talk about it, and he let the subject drop. She'd tell him when she was ready. She always did.

---------------

Two days later they were having breakfast when Jonathan noticed she wasn't eating and had a decidedly greenish tint to her face. "You feeling okay?" he asked.

"My stomach's just a little upset. Too much coffee and not enough food over the past few weeks I think. I'll be okay."

He could see there was something she wasn't telling him but he didn't pry. However after she left to head into work for the day, he did find the pregnancy test in the bathroom trashcan that she tried to hide.

She didn't say anything to him, and again he didn't ask. But he wondered if Christopher knew.

---------------

Two days after that, Mei arrived home unexpectedly in the middle of the afternoon. She mumbled something about not feeling well and headed straight for her bedroom to lie down. She looked a little groggy and pale and Jonathan had just gotten up and his crutches underneath him to go check on her when he noticed a folded piece of paper that had fallen out of her jacket pocket. He picked it up and unfolded it. He saw the name of the clinic on the top and registered the words "Aftercare Instructions" before the realization hit him. He dropped his chin to his chest and let out a sigh.

Without knocking or asking permission, he went into her bedroom. He could hear her softly crying and she was curled up in a ball on top of the quilt. Without hesitation he ungracefully managed to curl up behind her on the bed and gently pulled her in close. He pressed his cheek to the side of her head and said softly, "You should have told me. You okay?"

"I couldn't keep it."

"I know." He knew the same way he knew she wasn't going to say yes if Christopher had proposed. She had something left unfinished. A part of herself that she had to go back and find before she'd allow herself to go forward. Every step she took, and had taken since she was nine years old, was towards the singular goal of finding a way back to her father. He knew she cared about Christopher, maybe even loved him in her own way, but also knew that she wasn't ready to settle down into the steadfast role of wife and mother. In fact, it wasn't a role he could ever see her in until there were two floating cities in Pegasus, each with their very own John Sheppard.

He held her until her breathing had evened out and she was almost asleep. Her soft voice surprised him as she whispered, "Jonathan?"

"Yeah, I'm here."

As she faded off to sleep her words trailed off, answering the unasked question that was echoing in his head, "I would have kept yours...."

---------------------------------------------  
_'Lantis -- Day 65_

John and Jonathan were looking for Mei. John started to turn a corner and quickly put a hand up to stop Jonathan. With a grin John put his finger to his lips for Jonathan to be quiet. They peeked back around the corner to an area that was filled with multi-colored sunlight streaming in through the beautiful stained glass the Ancients were so fond of to see Mei there with her eyes closed as she went through the motions of some sort of ancient waltz to music only she could hear.

John whispered, "Atlantis sings to her. Just her."

The look of pure joy on Mei's face was one Jonathan had never seen before. And for the first time he realized that it wasn't just her father that Mei had been missing all these years. It was the city herself. Mei was home. She was finally home.

There was something humbling about that thought and Jonathan gave a little nod to John and the two men left as quietly as they arrived, leaving Mei to her music.

---------------

Later that night Jonathan caught Mei as she was leaving the dining room with fresh cup of tea in hand. She was heading back to one of the terminals to keep inputting needed code. Jonathan was hungry and looking for a sandwich. Mei tagged along with him back to the kitchen and kept him company as he rooted around for food.

As he made his sandwich he teased, "Your dad and I saw you dancing earlier."

Mei blushed and shot back, "You weren't supposed to see that."

"He said that Atlantis sings to you, and only you."

Mei shrugged. "I'm just special I guess."

_"It is appropriate to sing to one's offspring."_

After two months on the city, Jonathan was starting to get used to the city butting into conversations. But he did take exception to the city calling Mei _her_ offspring. It just wasn't right. But before he could say anything, Mei pressed her finger to his lips and said, "Don't argue with her. It's not worth the effort. My dad tried for years and never won."

Mei addressed the city, "'Lantis, I love it when you sing to me. I always have."

_"One sang to you even as you incubated."_

"I didn't know that," Mei said with a smile.

Jonathan squeezed some mustard onto his sandwich and asked, "What does it sound like?

A dreamy sort of look came over Mei's face and she tried to explain, "It's like a hundred voices all coming from one person, all singing different keys and melodies. And then there's music in the back ground behind it all. It's hard to explain."

"I bet it's beautiful."

She smiled widely. "It is." Looking up she asked the city, "'Lantis, will you let Jonathan hear too?"

_"You wish to share One with the Anomaly?"_

Mei's brow furrowed. Answers to Atlantis' queries sometimes had to be worded carefully and the true context gleaned from the city's choice of words. "Jonathan and I share everything 'Lantis. And I would very much like to share you with him."

Atlantis didn't respond formally, but a heartbeat later Mei saw the exact moment when John heard 'Lantis sing for the first time.

He closed his eyes and just let the music in his mind wash over him. He had always thought opera was powerful, but the song of the city was something else entirely.

A little while later John was treated to the sight of Mei and Jonathan dancing as he stood in the doorway to the dining area. It seemed to be a silly, lighthearted moment between them. As he watched them, John suspected they shared a lot of those little moments. He walked away and let them have their fun in private, and as he did, John wondered what it was exactly keeping the two of them apart. As he had gotten to know both of them over the past couple of months John could see the bond between them was a force unto itself. And once he had gotten past the idea that Jonathan was Jack's clone he had started to both like and respect the man for himself. John couldn't even begin to comprehend what it had to be like to be Jonathan. Most men would have lost their minds a long time ago, but somehow Jonathan survived. And John wondered what exactly it was that kept Jonathan sane.

The muted sound of Mei laughing in the dining area traveled down the hall and John suspected that he had his answer.

---------------------------------------------  
_6 years ago -- 2027_

"She shoots, she scores, the crowd goes wild." Mei taunted as Jonathan fished the puck out of the net.

"Lucky shot," he zinged back.

They were goofing around on the ice, waiting for the rest of the folks that had signed up for the friendly weekly game. Most were from the SGC where everyone's schedule was far too fluid to allow anyone to sign up for a formal league. The casual games where people could come and play as their schedules permitted were a good alternative for the base hockey nuts. And under Mei's carefully tended encouragement, more and more women were showing up to play.

As folks filled in, there were some new faces in the crowd, both playing and as spectators. Mei decided to play on the opposite team from Jonathan, wanting to rub his nose in the "lucky shot" comment a little. Her Uncle Jack had Mei on skates the same week she first moved to Washington with him. Hockey had been a way for her to make friends and gave her and Jack an opportunity to bond. And once Sam got involved and started teaching Mei the math and physics behind the game, Mei became an absolute terror on the ice, as Jonathan found out the first time they played and he told her he would go easy on her.

About halfway through the game, Mei noticed something and circled around Jonathan to tease him, "Don't look now but_ someone's_ got a fan."

Jonathan tried to go for casual and scanned the people watching the game and caught one of the new nurses at the SGC, Linda Greene, watching him with interest. Linda was a pretty blonde in her early thirties.

Jonathan didn't date much. And when he did it was rarely more than two dates with any one woman. He just didn't want any sort of long-term relationship. Mei knew he would sometimes go out to the bars with the guys and that he didn't go home alone. He was after all a healthy thirty-nine year old with physical needs, but he never let any of the women get close to him. He treated them with respect and honesty, but he never made them any promises, and never knowingly broke anyone's heart.

So it was with curiosity that Mei watched Jonathan actually flirt with Linda and offer to teach her how to play.

---------------

Five months later, Mei made Jonathan choke on his orange juice in the commissary when she asked casually, "Should I mention that Linda and friends were in the women's locker room giggling over the latest issue of a bridal magazine?"

When he could breathe again he exclaimed, "_What_?"

Mei sipped her coffee then nodded. "Sorry. I thought maybe I was going to be the last one to know."

He scrubbed his face with his hands, and groaned. "I'm not getting married."

Mei replied gently, "I know that, and you know that, but somehow I don't think Linda knows that. I thought you were going to sit down and have a talk with her."

"Yeah, well. You _know_ how good at that I am."

Since the night of the hockey game, Jonathan and Linda had been seeing each other. For him it wasn't serious, they had fun and enjoyed each other's company but that was all he wanted. Linda on the other hand, had fallen in love and wanted to plan a future together. Linda also wasn't particularly tolerant of Mei's place in Jonathan's life. And there was a coolness between the two women the likes of which the Arctic Circle had never seen.

---------------

The animosity between the women had grown to gale force about a month ago when Mei got a call that woke her up from a dead sleep.

"Mei, it's Mom."

Mei was trying to figure out which end was up, they had just spent a week on a planet with thirty-five hour days and her sleep cycle was all out of whack. She looked at her clock and saw that it was seven o'clock in the evening.

"Mom, hi, what's up?"

"Do you know where Jonathan is?"

"Probably home sleeping. We just got back late last night. Weird sleep schedule. Why? Is something wrong?"

"Mei, Sara O'Neill died early yesterday of a massive stroke."

"Oh, god. How is Uncle Jack?"

"He's... had better days. But we don't know if Jonathan knows or not. And between you and me, he shouldn't be alone."

"I'll find him."

"The funeral is the day after tomorrow. We're coming down for it."

"Okay. Call me if you need me."

"You too."

Mei threw on jeans and a sweatshirt and grabbed her keys. At Jonathan's apartment complex she looked around and saw his truck in it's numbered spot. A further glance at the lot told her Linda's car wasn't there. She breathed a little sigh of relief on that one. Linda did not know about Jonathan's origins. And trying to explain why Jonathan would take the death of a seventy-three year old woman so hard was not high on Mei's list of things to do for the day.

Mei knocked and got no response. She only hesitated a moment before using the key to his apartment that lived on her ring. He wasn't in the apartment. But the newspaper was open on the table to the obituaries, and Sara's name in bold print was impossible to miss. He knew. But where was he?

She didn't have to search for him. As she was trying to figure out where exactly he would have gone, her cell phone rang. Jonathan.

A short time later she was sliding onto the barstool next to his. There were many empty shot glasses in front of him. And when he turned towards her there was pain so old and so deep in his eyes it brought tears to her own. She reached over and took his hand. His reaction was to latch on it hers like he was afraid she would somehow disappear.

"C'mon. I'll take you home," Mei said gently.

She got him home, and up all four flights of stairs to his apartment. He was lying on the couch under an afghan as close to being passed out as a person could get without actually being passed out. Mei had carefully folded the newspaper back up and tucked it safely on top of the refrigerator knowing he would probably want it.

A knock on the door broke the quiet in the apartment. Mei answered the door to see Linda standing there. Linda's irritation at finding Mei at Jonathan's apartment was evident on her face. And it grew as Mei held onto the door and didn't let her inside.

"Hi, Linda. Look, ah, now's not really a great time. Jonathan found out earlier that someone he was close to died yesterday. He went and got pretty drunk and he's almost asleep now."

"Well, I'll just go check on him, make sure he's okay."

"I think it'd be better if you didn't. I'll let him know you stopped by."

Mei's hand on the door didn't give an inch even as Linda tried to push past her. There was ice in Linda's eyes as she spat out, "Fine. I'll be by tomorrow when _he's_ awake."

Mei closed the door quietly and shook her head. There were going to be repercussions from that little exchange, she was sure.

She headed for the kitchen to find a snack to appease her growling stomach and was standing in front of the open fridge when she felt Jonathan's hands on her shoulders to clumsily turn her around. She turned and he pulled her in tightly. His voice was low and hoarse as he whispered, "Thank you."

She squeezed him back and replied, "Any time."

Mei fixed them some food and they ate in silence. The grief coming from Jonathan was almost tangible in the room. After they ate he took her by the hand and pulled her towards his bedroom. Fully clothed they crawled under covers and there in the dark she held him close as he let out his tears for the woman he had loved so long ago. As she gently stroked his head as he slept, Mei realized that a part of him still loved Sara, would always love Sara, and would now always miss her too. She also realized that Jonathan had a lifetime ahead of him of watching people he used to know and love grow old and die. And she wondered if that's why he was clinging to her like she was some sort of lifeline. In the years to come, she would be one of the few left that knew who he really was, where he came from.

The funeral was somber, but the day bright and sunny. The church service was well attended. And the flowers abundant. If anyone thought it odd that there were two somewhat out of place arrangements of bright and cheerful sunflowers among the rest of the tasteful, elegant funeral baskets no one mentioned it. If anyone had taken the time to look, they would have seen that one of those baskets of sunflowers was from Jack. A different, tasteful arrangement bore a card with both he and Sam's name on it, but the sunflowers were from Jack and Jack alone. The other basket of sunflowers had no card. But Jack knew whom it was from.

Jonathan had been adamant that he shouldn't attend the funeral. He was afraid that people that knew a younger Jack would question his appearance. Mei was sitting with Jack and Sam during the service. Partway through she heard the church door open and she turned to see Jonathan slipping into a back pew. She couldn't see his eyes behind the dark glasses he had on, but she was glad that he came.

At the cemetery he hung towards the back of the crowd and wasn't surprised when he found Mei's hand in his. Sara was quietly laid to rest next to Charlie and the crowd dispersed. Jonathan slipped his hand out of Mei's and walked towards Charlie's headstone. She was going to follow when Sam gave her sleeve a little tug and a nod to give Jack and Jonathan a few minutes of privacy.

Jonathan's hands were deep in his pockets as he looked at the stone. It had weathered in the thirty-odd years it had been there.

Jack stepped up side-by-side to the other man and asked quietly, "How are _you_ doing?"

Everyone had been asking Jack that all day. Especially the friends and family that remembered how great Jack and Sara had been together, and of course, Charlie.

"I don't know," was Jonathan's honest response.

"Yeah. Me either. You send those other sunflowers?"

That got a smirk, or at least an almost smirk and Jonathan said by way of affirmation, "They were her favorites."

"Yeah, they were. She grew some every summer."

Jonathan forced a chuckle, "Remember when Charlie was five and picked them all on her?"

"I almost forgot about that. That was one hell of a bouquet. Man, was she mad."

The quiet stretched for a long moment and Jonathan said quietly, "I'm gonna have to do this too many more times. I'm going to bury everyone I... we ever knew."

Jack's own mind cringed at the horror of that thought; it was something he hadn't considered for his clone. And he did something he hadn't done in all the years his clone, no, Jonathan, had existed: he reached out and gave the other man's shoulder a squeeze of support. "I know. I'm sorry."

They turned and walked slowly back to where Sam and Mei were waiting. Jack and Sam were heading back to the reception. Mei stood next to her car with Jonathan and saw him looking sadly at the fresh grave one last time. She reached up and stroked his cheek, wiping away and hiding the evidence that his tears had snuck out on him. She said quietly, "You'll always have me you know. Always."

He swallowed hard and reined his emotions back in and replied with a sad little smile, "I know."

She was about to offer to cook him dinner when his cell phone rang. Linda.

Mei gave him a peck on the cheek and said lightly, "You should get that."

As Mei walked away and got in her car she heard him do just that.

---------------------------------------------  
_'Lantis -- Day 86_

Jonathan and John slipped through the gate in a jumper and it disengaged behind them. The planet they were on was bucolic and peaceful. The people that had lived here were good farmers and generous to those in need. John knew they had storage sheds with food stuffed to the rafters and most likely fields full of crops ready to be harvested. Given that the world, like everything else in Pegasus, was now home to only ghosts, John did not think they would mind Atlantis resupplying from their stores.

They avoided the remains of corpses they saw, and worked quickly to load the jumper with what they needed. The vast pastures where the horses and sheep where kept were fenced in but had natural streams and plenty of grazing. The animals were fit, but wouldn't be forever. John swung open the wide gates and secured them, allowing the animals the full range of the planet. Jonathan also brought along information about how to formulate the plague cure and stapled it to the village buildings here and there on the oft chance that it might benefit someone.

Jonathan also found a new friend as he went from building to building. The village had many dogs, herding dogs mostly, but they were avoiding Jonathan and John, choosing instead to watch their actions from a distance. Jonathan had been a little wary when he had rounded a porch corner to see a big shaggy dog lying there in the shade, his tail thumping on the porch in greeting. The dog stood up and Jonathan found out that the dog only had three legs, either by accident or by birth there was just no way to tell at first glance. The dog made its way happily over to him and Jonathan crouched down and gave him a pet. He was a young dog, probably less than a year old, and Jonathan was surprised to feel that underneath his shaggy coat, the dog's ribs were hanging out. Unable to hunt and kill small game like the other dogs, he was slowly starving to death. Steeling his resolve that he wasn't able to save everything, Jonathan stood up and resumed his poster hanging, but found he had a tag-a-long.

Finishing up what they had to do, the two men met back at the jumper. Before either man could stop him, the dog went into the jumper and made himself at home on one of the bench seats in the back. John laughed and said, "He apparently missed the part about stowaways where they're not supposed to be seen sneaking on board."

Jonathan sighed, "I'll get him."

John could see the other man's heart really wasn't in it and offered, "No reason we can't take him back with us."

---------------

Mei met them in the jumper bay and her chuckles at seeing the dog were many as she looked between the two men. She teased, "Big tough guys, huh?"

She and the dog made fast friends. And she shared, "I had a great dog when I was a kid. Uncle Jack and I went and picked him out at an animal shelter. He was this fat, scruffy thing that had been owned by an elderly woman that died leaving him homeless. Rufus was his name. He was so funny and obnoxious and he fit in well with me and Uncle Jack."

Their new canine friend was on his back enjoying a good belly rub from Mei as she told her story. John asked, "What happened to Rufus?"

With a sad little smile Mei replied, "He died of old age a few months before I left for college. His ashes are buried up at Uncle Jack's cabin." John noticed that Jonathan seemed to know this story already.

She looked down at the dog and said, "What are we going to call you?"

Jonathan opened his mouth to say something and Mei held up a finger to stop him and said, "No. We are not naming him Toto... _or_ Tripod. Forget it."

"You know, sometimes I swear you know me too well."

"Better than anybody else and don't you forget it. Now I'm going to go feed our hungry new friend here while you guys unload the jumper."

---------------

_"The canine is defective."_

"He's not defective. He was just born with three legs. He's a great dog," Mei countered.

_"Canines have four appendages. This canine is defective."_

---------------

Atlantis was a little put out that no one would agree with her that the dog was defective. And they all had a good laugh about that at dinner. Homer joined in by thumping his tail on the floor from where he was lying on a folded blanket near the window in the dining area. After eating a decent meal earlier, he had dozed happily in the sunshine streaming in through the windows. Mei decided that was now "his spot" and had moved his bowls there and added the blanket. Homer was now a very content canine.

John had caught the looks exchanged between Mei and Jonathan when she told them what name she had decided on for the dog. There was definitely something significant to the name besides the obvious reference to an old television cartoon.

---------------------------------------------  
_5 years ago -- 2028_

"I still think this is going to be weird," Jonathan groused as he drove, making familiar turns without missing a beat.

"Probably, but he's making an effort and so will you," Mei chided from the passenger seat.

They pulled into the driveway of the cabin and Jonathan turned off the truck. He swallowed hard as he looked around, not much had changed at the cabin in the twenty-five years since he had last been there. There were some new flowers and plants edging the cabin, and the surrounding trees had all grown, but over all it was like walking into a picture of his past.

Sam came out the front door and Mei met her halfway and gave her a big hug. Mei whispered, "What's the weather like here?"

"A little cloudy with a chance of thunderstorms." Given that it was a beautifully clear summer day, they weren't talking about the weather.

"Yeah. Same in the truck."

"I'm thinking that the copious application of beer might help," Sam offered with a grin.

"For them or us?" Mei countered.

When Sam had called and asked Mei if she had plans for the Fourth of July weekend Sam never expected Jack to tell her to tell Mei to bring Jonathan if he wanted to come along. Neither man would talk about it, but ever since Sara's funeral the ice between them had been melting a little. Enough so that they could be in each other's company for small periods of time without killing each other. It was still weird and exceptionally uncomfortable, but they could be civil.

Mei had been equally surprised when Jonathan actually said he'd like to go. Mei and Sam decided it was probably prudent that they not try to sleep under the same roof however, and they were staying in a cabin on the other edge of town. And that was a pleasant surprise for Jonathan all on its own.

Jack made his way slowly around the side of the house. His wooden cane had been replaced with a sturdy metal one with four wide feet that could take all of his weight and not sink into the grass. He was getting old, but fighting it every step of the way.

Jonathan had gotten out of the truck and made his way over to them. Jack stuck out his hand and said, "Glad you could make it."

Jonathan swallowed and replied, "Thanks for the invitation."

Sam and Mei shared a look that screamed, "would you look at that, the world didn't stop turning".

Jack asked Jonathan tentatively, "Did you bring your gear? Fish are biting."

Sam and Mei headed into the house and left the men to their fishing.

---------------

The day actually went well. The quiet fishing and beer let both men relax and not have to feel like they had to force conversation. Later on, they split the barbecuing duties up between them and they compared notes about charcoal and varieties of their favorite marinade- beer.

As they sat at the picnic table and ate, anecdotes were shared, as was news about different folks they all knew both on and off world. From the outside, it appeared to be just a normal family barbecue. But it was anything but a normal family.

Jack asked Jonathan, "Hey, whatever happened to that nurse you were seeing?"

Mei choked on her beer.

Jonathan warned her, "Not a word."

"But...?"

"Not a word."

Sam piped up, "Okay now _I'm_ curious. What happened?"

Mei giggled and Jonathan dropped his chin to his chest and shook his head in defeat.

Mei said, "Let's just say their breakup was fairly... revealing." Mei never would have teased Jonathan about it if he had been at all upset over his breakup with Linda, but since it had actually been somewhat of a relief to him, it was fair game for teasing.

"You're not helping," Jonathan whined.

"What? I didn't tell them how I had to come rescue you in the middle of the night when she locked you out of her house wearing just your boxer shorts and socks."

"I should drown you in that pond."

Jack piped in, "Don't do that. It'll scare the poor fish."

The laughter around the table that followed was genuine.

Later on, they all went into town and watched the fireworks that were put on every year. It was a fun end to an overall surprisingly pleasant day.

Sam and Jack headed home, and Mei and Jonathan went back to the other cabin.

---------------

The cabin wasn't exactly the same as Jack's, but it was similar. As was the acreage and accompanying pond. Sam had been Mei's partner in crime in finding it. It needed work, and hadn't been as well kept as Jack's, but it had its own appeal.

Jonathan was pouring each of them a nightcap while Mei went to go get something out of her room. They met back at the couch and she traded him her drink for a rolled up piece of paper tied with a wide red, white, and blue ribbon.

He set his glass down on the coffee table and asked, "What's this?"

"Happy Birthday," she said.

"It's not my birthday."

"Fine, be that way. Happy Independence Day then."

He slipped the ribbon off the paper and unrolled it. He scanned it quickly and looked up at Mei, the confusion evident in his eyes.

She explained, "It's the deed to this cabin. In your name. I bought it for you."

"You bought me a _cabin_?" he asked incredulously.

She grinned mischievously and teased, "And your very own pond too."

"Why did you do this?"

"Because it's time for you to have something that's yours. Something that belongs only to you."

Jonathan got up and went and stared out the window at the night. He felt Mei behind him and wasn't surprised when her arms slipped around his waist and her cheek pressed against his back. His voice was low as he asked, "Am I really so transparent?"

"Just to the one that knows you best."

He turned around slowly and she didn't break her embrace. "Thank you."

She reached up and stroked his cheek as she had so many other times and said simply, "You're welcome."

Kissing her was the most natural thing in the world under the circumstances, and she responded in kind. And because it was going so well he was surprised when he felt her hand between them pushing on him to put some space between them. She swallowed hard and whispered, "This isn't a good idea. It was an unmitigated disaster the last time."

His brow furrowed and he asked quietly, "You still haven't forgiven me have you?"

"I forgave you a long time ago. But I can't forget. I'm not her, Jonathan. I can never be her. I'm sorry."

"I know who you are, Mei."

"I know you do here," she put a finger to his temple, "but I don't think you always do here," she moved her hand to rest on his heart.

Before he could formulate a response she stepped away from him and said softly, "Good night, Jonathan," and headed for her room.

---------------

Jack wanted Sam's opinion on the Mei/Jonathan situation, but didn't know how to bring it up. As it turned out he didn't have to. They had just climbed into bed and turned off the lights when Sam asked out of the blue, "Do you think there's something more than friendship between them?"

"I don't know," he answered honestly.

"Would you be alright with it if there were?"

"I don't know."

Sam chuckled at his repeated response and he asked, "Would you be?"

Sam rolled over and leaned up on her elbow so she could see Jack's face in the moonlight. "Oddly enough, I think I would be. He's not... well... you, anymore. He's been his own person for what, over twenty-five years now? But at the same time, all those great qualities that attracted me to you are there in him. He's strong and dependable, and smart and funny, and he has honor. As a mother I couldn't ask for a better combination in a person for my daughter to fall for. I'd just have to overlook knowing where he came from."

"Mei told me a long time ago that she doesn't see me when she looks at Jonathan. Do you think that's possible?"

"Yeah, in Mei's case I do. Remember when that alternate me came through the mirror?"

"Yeah."

"You remember how she was me, but wasn't me all at the same time?"

"Yeah."

"That's how Mei sees everyone. People might look the same but they're all different to her. And I think somehow that she just might be the only person that can look at Jonathan, knowing exactly where he came from, and not see you."

"Got a point there. But..." he sighed, "but I raised her. You don't think that it's weird?"

"That's just it, Jack, _you_ raised her. He didn't. He never even _met_ Mei as a child. She was already out of college and a full-grown adult woman when they first met."

"True."

Sam reached over and traced Jack's lip gently with her finger and teased, "Sometimes looking at them is like looking at us through a mirror that's just a little out of focus."

Jack chuckled, "More like a fun house mirror."

Sam nestled down in the crook of Jack's arm and laid her head on his chest and said a bit more seriously, "Everybody deserves to be happy, Jack. And whatever _is_ between them seems to do that for both of them, and if it's more than friendship then I think we're just going to have to find a way to accept it."

"Or borrow a zat so I don't have to try and hide his body."

Sam laughed and gave his stomach a playful swat.

---------------

The next morning Jonathan was standing out in the yard with a cup of coffee surveying all that was now his. He heard Mei approach behind him and turned with a smile. "Good morning." Pretending that last night never happened seemed prudent to Jonathan. He had gotten good at pretending.

"Morning," she replied with a smile, then asked with a gesture of her hand around the property, "So what do you think?"

"It's perfect. Well almost perfect. Just needs some lazy dog named Homer lounging out on the dock in the sun."

She laughed, because of _course_ he would want to name a dog after the Simpsons.

---------------

Sam and Jack weren't expecting them that afternoon. But it was Jonathan that insisted that there was something he wanted to take care of before they had to head back to Colorado in a couple of days. And after a stop in town, he pulled his truck into their driveway.

Jack and Sam came out as Jonathan was lowering the tailgate so he could remove the lumber he had purchased in town.

Jack asked cautiously, "What's all this?"

"I'm gonna fix your dock."

When they had been out there fishing, Jack had cautioned him not to step on a certain dry-rotted plank. Jack told him he was going to have one of the local guys come out and replace all the dock planks after the holiday weekend, he just physically couldn't do it himself any longer. Jonathan had known what it cost Jack's pride to admit that to his younger clone and he wanted to even the score.

"Why? I told you I'd get one of the local guys to do it."

"Didn't you hear? I _am_ one of the local guys now."

---------------------------------------------  
tbc...

_Age table for those interested:_

Mei

2008- 09 (Mei arrived in this reality)  
2021- 22 (Mei & Jonathan meet)  
2033- 34 (Mission to go to other reality)  
2037- 38 (Epilogue)

Jonathan (physical age)

2003- 15 (Jonathan created by Loki)  
2021- 33 (Mei & Jonathan meet)  
2033- 45 (Mission to go to other reality)  
2037- 49 (Epilogue)

Jack  
2003- 51 (Jonathan created by Loki)  
2008- 56 (Mei arrived in this reality)  
2021- 69 (Mei & Jonathan meet)  
2033- 81 (Mission to go to other reality)  
2037- 85 (Epilogue)

Sam/John (this reality)  
2008- 41 (Mei arrived in this reality)  
2021- 54 (Mei & Jonathan meet)  
2033- 66 (Mission to go to other reality)  
2037- 70 (Epilogue)

Sam/John (alternate reality)  
2010- 43 (Mei born)  
2014- 47 (Sam dies)  
2019- 52 (Mei sent away, arrival of 2033 mission)  
2037- 56 (Epilogue)

Laura Cadman (this reality)**  
2008- 27 (Mei arrived in this reality)  
2037- 56 (Epilogue)  
**I am basing her age on personal opinion  
given her appearance and rank in "Duet"


	3. Chapter 3

Note: This story goes back and forth between time lines. An age/year chart is located at the end of each section for clarification.

---------------------------------------------  
_'Lantis -- Day 104_

Mei let out a heavy sigh and answered the city's latest query, "I don't remember exactly. I think I was thirteen or fourteen. It happened while I was playing hockey. I was on the bottom of a pileup on the ice and someone's skate nicked my arm. It took a few stitches to get it closed."

_"One would inquire about the fractured wrist."_

Atlantis was grilling Mei on every scar and old injury she detected. "Um, I was twenty and slipped on a wet floor and tried to catch myself, spent the summer in a cast."

Even though Mei knew it was coming she grimaced when the city asked, _"One would inquire about the scars on your back."_

Mei swallowed hard and said quietly, "I don't want to talk about that 'Lantis."

Atlantis acquiesced to her request. But sought out another looking for the answer.

---------------

Jonathan was in the shower, letting the hot water work out the kinks from sitting hunched over wiring all day when Atlantis' voice practically exploded in his head. _ "One demands to know how the scars on the back of Mei were obtained."_

It was so loud in his head that Jonathan hit his knees in the shower. He held his head tightly as it felt like it would sure burst. He managed to ask through gritted teeth, "Did you ask _her_?"

_"She will not tell One how they were obtained. One demands answer."_

Over and over the city demanded answers and Jonathan kept refusing to answer. His brain finally couldn't take any more of the city's abuse and he blacked out.

He came to with the bright light of a penlight shining in his eyes. He groaned and quickly turned to the side and emptied the contents of his stomach. When he dared to open his eyes again he saw the doctor hovering over him, and just behind him Mei and John.

Mei's eyes were sad and he croaked out, "I didn't tell her."

Mei didn't say anything but bit her lip and nodded. John was confused and asked, "Tell her what?"

When neither Jonathan nor Mei would answer, the city took matters into her own hands, "One demands to know how the scars on the back of Mei were obtained."

John turned to Mei, "What scars?"

Mei cast one final sad look at Jonathan and turned her back towards her father and lifted her t-shirt. The silvery lines criss-crossed her back, some thick, some thin. Seemingly hundreds of them. Jonathan wanted to turn away but didn't, even though his mind's eye changed the view and he could still clearly see the blood dripping from each cut.

John's hand ghosted over the scars of it's own volition. His mouth tried to form something coherent but nothing would come out. Finally he managed, "What... happened?"

Mei pulled down her shirt and hastily wiped her eyes before turning back around. Her voice was flat and let John know that the matter wasn't open for discussion as she said, "A mission went sideways."

---------------

Later that night there was someone at the door to Jonathan's quarters. He opened it to see John standing there with two six-packs of beer in hand. He held one out to Jonathan and said in a matter-of-fact way, "You and I are gonna get drunk. Then you're going to tell me what happened on that mission."

It wasn't a request.

---------------------------------------------  
_Four Years ago -- 2029_

They were walking in the directions of the abandoned buildings the UAV had sent back. There weren't any detectable energy readings but the buildings, although in disrepair and being taking over by plant life, were fairly modern in appearance and warranted a further look.

Mei was not a timid soul, and being in the woods normally didn't bother her. Her Uncle Ronon had started taking her into the woods and teaching her things when she was a mere three years old, not to mention how many weekend backpacking trips she and Uncle Jack had squirreled away when he was stationed in Washington. So when she hiked a little closer to him than normal and said, "This place is giving me the creeps," Jonathan listened and dialed his senses up a notch.

When the attack came out of nowhere Major Sanders was on point and the first to fall, an arrow shaft protruding grotesquely through his throat.

Mei, Jonathan, and their archaeologist Dr. Krauss were all hit, not by arrows but by blow darts. One by one they fell to the soft mat of leaf litter on the forest floor without ever seeing their attackers.

---------------

Jonathan woke up on the ground where he had fallen. He looked around quickly and saw Krauss also waking up, as well as Sanders' body. There was no sign of Mei or their weapons.

Jonathan barked at Krauss to get back to the gate and dial home to inform the SGC of the situation. And with the Ka-bar that had been hidden in his boot as his only weapon, Jonathan went to find Mei.

---------------

The SGC quickly mobilized a search party. And General Lorne did not even hesitate to contact Sam and Jack. Notifying Sheppard on Atlantis would have to wait for the time being. But Sam and Jack were in the SGC before the search party's first scheduled check-in thanks to there being a ship in orbit.

Krauss was babbling a hundred miles a minute in the conference room. When he got to the part about Jonathan going off after Mei, Krauss' voice grew serious and he said, "I've never see anything like that in a man's eyes before."

Sam and Jack just looked at each other. When they were finally left alone for a few minutes, Jack said in a low voice, "This is going to be bad."

"Yeah, I know."

A quiet moment stretched and they were both deep in their own thoughts. Sam met Jack's eyes and said, "You do realize he hasn't actually ever killed anyone right? Well not since... you know, the split."

A little hint of the darkness that he tried to keep buried and far away from Sam surfaced for a second in his eyes and he said, "Trust me, he hasn't forgotten how."

---------------

It took him three days to track them. They seemingly had the ability to blend into the forest and just disappear. He tracked and backtracked until he found them.

There were over a dozen filthy men in a crude camp built into a hillside. They appeared to be scavengers of some kind judging by their rag-tag appearance and odd assortment of camp furnishings. Jonathan's quick eye took in every scrap of tactical data that he could and he was trying to formulate some sort of sensible plan to get Mei out of there. But then he saw her and the red veil of rage fell over his eyes and all he wanted to do was kill. Kill them all.

Naked, she was dragged by a leash tied to her bound hands through the camp by the group's leader. She was barely able to stand, let alone walk. Her face had more than one hand print shaped bruise, and when the leader jerked her over to a post in the center of the camp and secured her hands to it, Jonathan could see that she had been whipped. Her back was a mass of crusted and oozing red zig-zags. She had lost so much blood that there were thick dried rivers of it down the backs of her legs.

By the time the leader had leaned in close to Mei to say, "I have a pile of fresh switches here. Now you _will_ tell me the symbols to other worlds," Jonathan had slit the throat of the first sentry guarding the camp.

When she didn't say anything the leader opened up a fresh stripe on her back, and then another and another until all his switches were broken. When Mei finally hung limply by her arms, three more of the camp's men had felt Jonathan's steel against their throats.

The leader took Mei's chin in his hands and made her meet his eyes and spat out, "Hear me well woman, if you do not tell me the symbols by morning, I will give you to my men for their amusement, and they have not had a woman in a very, very long time. You would do well to heed my warning and give me what I want and I will allow you to return to your own people untouched."

He left her hanging there all night. And as Jonathan stealthily went about his grizzly business in the dark, he would see flashes of her through the trees, the blood dark against her pale skin in the dying campfire light.

The leader finally took himself off to bed, leaving Mei on display. Man after man died in the dark by Jonathan's sure hand. Finally there were only two left, the leader and one other that had sat up poking the embers of the campfire. The weaselly man had thought that since there was no one else around, that he could force himself on Mei as she stood there tied to the post.

He had just stepped up behind her and unfastened his pants when the rock smashed his head like an eggshell. Again and again Jonathan brought that rock down, long after the man was good and dead.

Not wanting to, but needing something to cover Mei with, Jonathan grabbed a grungy blanket out of the nearest tent. He gently cut an unconscious Mei down and placed her carefully on the blanket at the edge of the woods on a soft bed of moss. Then he went back to the camp. He had one more bit of business to attend to there.

Jonathan dragged the leader out of a sound sleep from his tent and in short order had the man's feet and one hand tied to the very same post Mei had been tied to. The whole time, Jonathan never said a word. And he never said a word as he slit the man's stomach open, allowing his entrails to come pouring out. The leader had a choice, he could try and use his free hand to untie himself or he could use it to hold his guts together. And as he walked way and left the man there screaming, Jonathan still never said a word.

---------------

When Jonathan walked up to the gate carrying Mei, no one had to tell the men there to dial the gate. They scrambled to do it immediately.

Jack, Sam, Lorne, and John Sheppard in from Atlantis, were all in the conference room when the incoming wormhole appeared. None of them were prepared for what they saw when Jonathan walked through the event horizon still carrying Mei in that dirty blanket.

The worst of Mei's injuries were hidden by the blanket. It was the sight of Jonathan that stopped everyone in their tracks. He was filthy and he was covered in blood. And upon anyone getting close to him, they could see bits of what looked like brain and other bodily tissue in his hair and on his clothes. There was something primal and savage in his countenance. This was not the same lighthearted man that had stepped through the gate four days ago.

He never said a word to anyone in the gate room. He lifted his eyes for a moment to the four standing at the window above before striding down the ramp and all the way to the infirmary with Mei in his arms.

Jonathan gently lay Mei down on one of the clean infirmary beds and after a fierce look that made the medical staff give him a moment, he deftly removed the filthy rag that he had had to cover her with and modestly pulled a clean white sheet up over her.

The four from the conference room were there a moment later and saw him standing with his hands fisted around that blanket at the foot of Mei's bed as the medical staff swarmed around her.

Jonathan turned when they entered and it was Jack's eyes he sought out. There was ice on both sides, neither man giving anything away.

The doctor in charge announced she was evicting everyone except Sam so they could care for Mei. Everyone held their breath for a moment, not quite sure if Jonathan was going to comply. It was John that got him to move. He curled one hand around Jonathan's bicep and put the other on the back of Jonathan's shoulder and gently, but firmly, steered him out of the infirmary. In a low voice, for Jonathan's ear only, John said, "C'mon. Let's get you cleaned up. You don't want her to wake up and see you like this."

Jonathan capitulated and let John lead the way to the locker room. Jack followed, leaving Sam with Mei.

In the locker room John sat Jonathan down on the bench and went and grabbed a couple of towels and washcloths. He asked Jonathan quietly, "Any of this yours?"

Jonathan shook his head in response and tried to get his fingers to work to undo his boots but the shakes had started to set in. John and Jack had both been where Jonathan was at one point or another in their long careers and there was no embarrassment or hesitation over helping him get undressed and getting him under the hot shower spray to wash the blood and gore off of his body.

While Jonathan stood under the scalding water John picked his bloody clothes and threw them in the trash. He picked up the dirty blanket Jonathan had brought with him from the infirmary and was about to put in that same trash when Jack's hand on his wrist stopped him. Jack hadn't said a word since they were in the conference room, and he didn't speak now, instead just giving John a subtle shake of his head. John left the blanket on the bench.

When Jonathan was finally sitting back on the bench in a warm robe John asked, "How many were there?"

Jonathan swallowed hard and replied softly, "Seventeen."

Jack's voice came from the corner where he was standing in the shadow, "How many?"

Jonathan's tension was evident in the way his jaw was flexing, he looked up at Jack and the anguish in his eyes was apparent. He knew what Jack was asking him and swallowed hard again before replying in that same soft tone, "All of them."

---------------

Mei was alive. That was what they all kept telling themselves. Everything else could be fixed. She was dehydrated and had a mild concussion, not to mention the lacerations on her back and subsequent loss of blood. There had been a collective sigh of relief when it was determined that she had not been raped. They were doing what they could to prevent infection and scarring and had given her a blood transfusion along with several units of fluids. Sam had even tried the Goa'uld healing device with limited success. What was worrying them all was that she hadn't regained consciousness yet.

Jack, Sam, and John rotated shifts in the hard plastic chair next to her bed, talking to her and holding her hand so she wouldn't be alone when she woke up. Her vital signs were strong, and her EEG was normal. There was no reason she wasn't waking up. Unless she just didn't want to.

General Lorne's search party on the planet found the camp. And after recovering the SGC weaponry, they returned home and Parsons, the lieutenant colonel in charge of the search, met privately with the general to debrief about what they found. Parsons had a wife about Mei's age, and he had two younger sisters and in his mind the carnage that they had found at the camp was more than justified and he told the general exactly that. He also turned over the only video evidence of the scene.

Later on Lorne debriefed Jack and John while Sam sat with Mei. When they had viewed all the video, a quiet hush fell over the room. John and Lorne looked at Jack with a new appreciation, which he just shrugged off with a tilt of his head. As they wrapped up their meeting, Lorne gave the memory card containing the video footage to Jack. His only explanation was, "Some things look better on paper."

Jonathan himself was holed up in one of the quarters on base. He hadn't spoken to anyone since the locker room.

---------------

Twenty-four hours later, Mei still had not awoken. In the quiet of the nighttime infirmary Sam was sitting silently, holding Mei's hand when quiet footsteps made her look up to see Jonathan standing at the end of Mei's bed. His brow was furrowed and his eyes sad as he looked down at Mei.

Sam heard him whisper, "I'm sorry," before quickly turning and leaving the infirmary. She wasn't sure if he were talking to her or to Mei.

---------------

A half-hour later, Jonathan left his resignation letter on Lorne's desk and left the mountain with no plans to return.

---------------

Three hours after that, Mei woke up holding Jack's hand. Her first hoarsely whispered word as she tried to focus her eyes was, "Jonathan?"

Jack wasn't sure if that was who she saw or who she wanted, or both.

---------------

Mei looked down at the man passed out on the bed. He was the epitome of unkempt with greasy hair and at least a five-day beard stubble, not to mention the dirty clothes and the smell of whiskey and cigarettes permeating from him. And adding to the filth was the grungy old blanket he was lying under.

She sighed; it had taken her a month to find him holed up in a mountainside cabin in Maine. Jonathan had resigned, made a large cash withdrawal from his bank account, and then simply disappeared. It had taken Mei two months to physically heal enough to go searching for him. There were probably only two people on the planet that could have actually found him, Jack being one and Mei the other. And find him she did.

Mei reached down and stroked his cheek gently and said as he opened his eyes, "You're a hard man to find."

His hand clumsily closed over hers with that same desperation he had shown when Sara died. "Mei?"

She smiled gently and said, "The one and only."

He closed his eyes a moment; half afraid she wasn't real. When he opened them again, she was still there, real and alive... and worried.

The cabin was remote and had no modern conveniences or indoor plumbing. Glad that she had stopped at the grocery store in town on her way up here, Mei rooted around and got the small wood stove going and after a quick trip outside to the well pump for water, she got some coffee cooking.

Coffee led to her fixing some ham and fried potatoes. Jonathan was as skinny as a rail and when she asked him when he last ate his only answer was a shrug.

When he went to light one, it and the rest of his cigarettes went into the wood stove and Mei warned him, "You'd better inhale now, because that's the last of those. _ Ever_."

He was slowly sobering up, and his body was rebelling. The shakes in his hands that had been there for months got worse and he was sweating cold buckets. Mei heated water that they brought outside where he peeled off his filthy clothes and scrubbed his hair and body with her help. After he was dressed in warm, clean clothes Mei parked him on the couch with another hot cup of coffee and went and stripped the bed and remade it with the remaining clean linens from the cupboard and opened the window to air the room. She dumped the entire pile of stench laden dirty linens, including that god-awful blanket outside, intending to burn them all the next day, there was just no hope of ever cleaning them.

As night fell, Mei changed into her own sweats and took Jonathan by the hand and led him to bed. She spooned up around him and he held her hand so tightly to his chest it almost hurt.

The sounds of nature outside and their breathing were the only sounds in the room until she heard Jonathan swallow hard and say, "I killed them all."

Mei gave him an extra squeeze and said softly, "I know."

"I was supposed to protect you."

"You got me home, Jonathan. You saved me."

"I wasn't fast enough. What they did..." his voice broke.

"Jonathan, listen to me right now, because we're only going to talk about this once. It was not your fault. Us getting captured, what they did to me, none of it. And I'm here and alive and sane because you _were_ fast enough to find me before they could all... rape me." It was the first time she had admitted out loud that being gang raped had been a very definite future fate for her. Her own voice broke a little and her tears started in earnest. "Everything else they did I was able to endure, but I wouldn't have been able to deal with that. And I didn't have to because you found me, and you sent every one of those bastards to the hell they deserved. And all I wanted when I woke up was to see you and tell you that, but you left. You just up and left me behind. We're supposed to be a team, you and me. But you left me behind all by myself. You left _me_ behind."

Her sobs started in earnest and she tried to back away from him but he quickly flipped around and pulled her into a tight embrace even as she pounded weakly on his chest. In between her sobs she kept repeating, "You left me behind."

His own tears mingled with hers and he didn't know what to say to make it better. Over and over, "I'm sorry," fell from his lips but it somehow didn't feel like enough. It would never be enough.

---------------

The next morning Jonathan woke first and looked over at a still sleeping Mei. Now that his mind wasn't clouded with whiskey he actually _saw_ her and he wanted to kick himself. There were deep circles under her eyes, the kind he hadn't seen in years on her face, not since he started helping her with her work to find a way back to her father. And she had been right last night; he had left her behind.

He slipped out of bed and gently pulled the blankets up over her. She sighed contently in her sleep and snuggled down into them. He smiled in spite of himself.

He quietly stoked up the wood stove and put the coffee on to perk. He headed outside and spied the pile of linens Mei had dropped there the day before. Picking up the pile he headed for the fire ring and dropped a sheet in to it. He fished the cigarette lighter out of his pocket and set the sheets ablaze in the fire pit. He was standing there holding the old blanket when Mei came out of the cabin with two cups of steaming coffee in hand. She put the coffee down on the rough-hewn picnic table and looked at the blanket in his hands. In the morning light she could see some rusty, brownish stains on it and she wondered why he was rubbing a thumb over one of them with an odd look on his face.

"Jonathan, where did you get that blanket?" she asked, even as understanding dawned in her mind all on its own.

He met her eyes but didn't reply, but the pain that she saw in them confirmed her theory. She stepped over to him and gently tugged it out his hands and tossed it on top of the burning sheets. Her hand found his and nothing else was said as they watched it turn to ash.

---------------

Over dinner Mei announced, "You and I are being reassigned to Atlantis for a while. We're to report for transport in three weeks."

"What? What are you talking about? I resigned."

"Righhhttt," she teased, drawing out the word. "Like anyone was going to take that seriously under the circumstances. We've both been on extended medical leave. But it's time for us to get back to work. Both of us."

"Mei...."

"Jonathan."

He knew he wasn't going to win, but he also knew he didn't want to face everyone at the SGC either.

---------------

A few days later they were walking along the lonely shore of the nearby lake enjoying the sunshine and warm weather. Mei was contemplative and had been since she woke up again nestled next to Jonathan like it was the most natural thing in the world.

She bent down and found a couple of flat stones and sent one skipping over the water and asked him lightly, "Do you think the elephant in the room is going to smother us in our sleep someday?"

He skipped a rock of his own and replied equally lightly, "I don't know. Maybe."

She chuckled wryly and sent another rock soaring, "Just to warn you, there's an interesting rumor running around the SGC."

He raised an eyebrow and asked, "And what exactly would that be?"

"That you and I secretly got married after you broke up with Linda."

"Oh, for crying out loud. Don't people have anything better to gossip about?"

"Nope. But you know how it is, give them some time and something new will take over the scuttlebutt."

They skipped a few more rocks and then started walking again. They found a soft sandy, little natural beach a about a quarter mile away and Mei happily kicked off her hiking boots and sat down to dig her toes into the sun warmed sand. Jonathan chuckled; she loved a beach, any beach.

Mei looked out at the water, her contemplative demeanor back. They sat side-by-side for a long time, just enjoying the quiet.

She asked, "Why didn't you ever get married?"

He thought for a moment and sighed before answering, "I almost did once. Her name was Karen."

Mei looked over and saw the wistful little smile that thinking about this Karen brought to his face, this was the first he had ever mentioned her. He continued, "We were both finishing up our degrees. She was gonna be a teacher. We were good together. But she had no idea who I was or where I came from."

Jonathan grew quiet and Mei could tell he was trying to put words together in his head and she let him tell her the story at his own pace without interruption. "It's... how do I explain this? When I... he, was married to Sara and doing classified missions, there were always lies about the missions and what he had been doing, but I... he, never had to lie to Sara about who _he_ was. With Karen I felt like I was lying to her all the time and I just couldn't marry her feeling that way. It's one thing to be dishonest about things you've done out of necessity, but having to be dishonest about who you _are_ is something else all together. Does that make any sense?"

Mei leaned and rested her head against his shoulder and replied, "Perfect sense. I think that's one reason you and I have such a strong connection. Neither of us can tell people who we really are or where we come from. I have it easier than you because I can point to John and Sam and say "those are my parents" and people accept it, but it's not really the truth and we both know that. But with you and I, we don't have to lie or worry about cover stories and security clearance. It's nice."

Jonathan tilted his head to hers and said, "Yeah."

Mei asked lightly, "Can I ask you a question? About... before?"

Mei never pestered him for information about his past memories and he was surprised but said, "Yeah."

"They really never... all those years?" He was fluent enough in Mei-speak to know she was asking about Sam and Jack.

"Couldn't. Regs."

"That wasn't the only reason though was it?"

He sighed, "It was a different time, Mei. We were at war with the Goa'uld. And nine times out of ten when we... they stepped through the gate it ended up being a combat situation. The job and protecting Earth had to come first."

"Were they really afraid they would blow a mission because of their personal feelings?"

"Couldn't take the chance."

"Just because they didn't act on them didn't make those feelings go away though did it?"

"No."

"So acting or not acting on the physical was really a moot point wasn't it?"

Jonathan sighed, "I guess it was. Can I ask where this is coming from all of a sudden?"

"You know I don't want to be anyone's girlfriend or wife. Not even yours."

"I know. And I even know why, Mei."

Her voice was quiet and matter-of-fact when she said, "I have to find my father."

"I know. We will. We're getting close."

"I've put my whole life on hold to do it."

"Mei, you're only thirty. You have a lot of years in front you yet."

"That's not necessarily true. I almost died, Jonathan." She dropped her eyes to the sand in front of her and her voice was wavering a bit as she continued, "As I was hanging there that last night all I could think was that I was going to die and there were things I hadn't said and done yet. Important things, and none of them had anything to do with finding my father."

"What kind of things?" he asked gently.

She turned towards him and her eyes searching his and whispered, "I know at least part of you is still in love with Sam. But is there another part that could maybe love just me? Because I realized when I woke up and you were gone that I... I need you, and I want to be with you so badly that I can't breathe when I think about it. But I can't be some sort of substitute for her, Jonathan. You have no idea how much it broke my heart when you called me Sam that first time. And I would rather keep pretending that the elephant in the room isn't there forever then to have to try to put myself back together like that again. I love you, but I'm just not that strong."

Hot salty tears had streamed down her cheeks as she spoke and he gently took her face in his hands and wiped them away before quietly answering. "I wish I could remember all of that night instead of just the bits and pieces I _can_ recall. And I can't tell you how many times I've wished I could go back and do that night all over again. I don't know why I said it. I meant it when I told you before that I know who you are, Mei. I don't look at you and see Sam. Sometimes your actions'll remind me of Sam a little, but I don't _see_ Sam when I look at you. I'd be lying if I said that I didn't have some old feelings buried in there for her. Just like I still have feelings for Sara. They're part of who I am, but they're also part of the past. You know, neither of us has been very good at looking toward the future, and I honestly don't know where it's gonna lead us. But you need to know, baby, that there isn't _any_ part of me that doesn't love you, no matter what that future holds."

"So where does that leave us?"

"Damned if I know," he said with a gentle grin.

That made Mei laugh a little and in a very un-ladylike way she wiped her nose on her sleeve. "I think we have a few options. We can keep pretending that big honking elephant isn't around, or I guess we could attempt some semblance of a normal relationship for all the world to see, or ...."

Jonathan interjected, "Or we can just be us, but without the pretending."

"I think I like that option."

As he leaned in to kiss her gently he whispered, "Me too."

---------------

They spent two more weeks at the cabin, reconnecting and exploring each other. And when they got back to Colorado and reported for transport to Atlantis, the people that knew them had never seen them more relaxed. And from all outward appearances nothing had changed between them, they were just back to being the upbeat and lighthearted pair they were before their last mission- and it sent the scuttlebutt into a tailspin.

---------------------------------------------  
_'Lantis -- Day 134_

Mei was sneaking out of Jonathan's room when Atlantis asked, _"Why do you conceal your relationship with the Anomaly?"_

They had only dared steal away some intimate time for themselves a few times since arriving on the city. And it was this precise conversation that Mei had wanted to avoid. That and wanting to give her father a little time to get used to the idea that she wasn't nine years old any longer.

"It's complicated, 'Lantis. Let's just say that we like our privacy."

_"You engage in sexual relations with the Anomaly and One senses that you also have strong emotional ties to the Anomaly, yet you choose not to reproduce together. One has genetically analyzed both you and the Anomaly. Offspring from your pairing will be gifted. And One could interact with the offspring."_

Mei sighed and found a little out of the way nook to sit in, and her hand was fondly on the wall and she said gently, "'Lantis, I know you want me to have children. And I know that you want them running through your halls so you can be with them as they grow up just like you did with me. But right now, at this point in my life, I... we, meaning Jonathan and I, aren't planning on having children. My life has been... well, consumed with finding a way to get you and Daddy safely to that other reality and Jonathan has supported me in my efforts to accomplish that. Yes, we have very strong emotional ties, and there isn't anyone in this universe or any other that I would rather become a parent with than him, but that's just not the relationship we have. We haven't discussed or planned anything for ourselves in the future beyond getting you both to the other reality. So I don't know exactly what that future will bring, and I don't know if children will be a part of it. I'm sorry 'Lantis."

_"One comprehends."_

That was the city's pat answer when she was going to further analyze the conversation. It generally meant that whichever human she was speaking with could expect to revisit the topic at a later time.

---------------

The team had a working lunch as they discussed their progress. The medical personnel reported happily that they had completed their work of decontaminating the city and that there were absolutely no residual plague contaminants remaining.

John was quiet and his countenance a little sad as they gave that detailed report. He had helped with the somber task of collecting and incinerating all of the corpses of his friends and colleagues. It was the last thing he could do for them all and was a way for him to say goodbye.

Construction of the devices' components was actually ahead of schedule and Mei looked at the report and announced happily, "Three months. We'll be ready to go in three months."

---------------

Jonathan was making his way to one of the piers with his fishing rod after working on wiring until his eyes crossed. They enforced the idea of a reasonably "normal" workday among the members of the team. There was nothing wrong with an occasional twelve or even sixteen-hour workday, but it was more beneficial to the mission if everyone got enough sleep and some mental downtime. Jonathan's personal favorite was to take off for any of the piers and see what he could reel in, and no one complained around the meal table when his catches were enthusiastically shared by all.

Jonathan saw John standing on a far pier corner, just looking out at the ocean. Jonathan approached and said lightly, "Nice out tonight."

John looked back over his shoulder and replied, "Yeah. But then again, even the storms are pretty spectacular here."

Jonathan stepped up and stood side-by-side with John. "Man, I needed some fresh air. My eyes were crossing."

"Sounds like everything is right on schedule."

"Yeah. Mei is ecstatic. Knock on wood, we haven't hit any snags or surprises."

There was an odd tone to John's voice as he said, "Yeah."

"Something bothering you?"

John shook his head, "No... yes... I dunno know. I've been trying to wrap my head around what it's going to be like for me. Everything and everyone I know is gone and I had accepted what was going to happen when I sent Mei off and set the self-destruct. I was ready to die. Now, I'm going to be some sort of odd man out."

Jonathan reached over and gave John's shoulder a squeeze, "I know all about how that feels. And it's not going to be easy, I won't lie to you. But living is always better than dying. And you're not going to be alone, you'll have Mei... and Atlantis."

John smiled a little and replied, "Yeah. That's true. So what about you? I know you guys have been working at this pretty non-stop for a couple years. What are you going to do when we get back to your reality?"

Jonathan shrugged, "I don't know. Whatever she wants I guess."

John thought about that for a moment then asked, "Can I ask you something personal?"

"Sure. Shoot."

"Are you in love with my daughter?"

Jonathan let out a slow breath, he had seen this coming at some point. "I don't know if you're going to like any answer I give you to that question. She and I are... well, I know it sounds cliche', but, it's complicated."

John turned towards him with a flat glare and said sarcastically, "So give me the _uncomplicated_ version."

Jonathan met John's stare and answered, "Daniel used to try and explain how important words were, because they have weight and meaning beyond just a simple definition. Frankly, I just don't think the word love has enough weight to describe what I feel for Mei," he paused and swallowed hard before continuing, "When we met she made me finally feel like my own man and not just some old carbon copy that everyone forgot about, and she showed me what it's like to have a soul and a life of my _own_ again. It's like she's this part of me that had always been missing, something I was looking for and didn't even know it. I followed her here to another time and reality, and I'm going to be right beside her when we all go back home. And after that, I just don't know. Like I said, it'll be whatever she wants."

John could see the honest emotion on the other man's face. And he asked, "So why haven't you married her? Had a family?"

Jonathan smiled sadly, "I've asked. She said no. Repeatedly."

---------------------------------------------  
tbc...

_Age table for those interested:_

Mei

2008- 09 (Mei arrived in this reality)  
2021- 22 (Mei & Jonathan meet)  
2033- 34 (Mission to go to other reality)  
2037- 38 (Epilogue)

Jonathan (physical age)

2003- 15 (Jonathan created by Loki)  
2021- 33 (Mei & Jonathan meet)  
2033- 45 (Mission to go to other reality)  
2037- 49 (Epilogue)

Jack  
2003- 51 (Jonathan created by Loki)  
2008- 56 (Mei arrived in this reality)  
2021- 69 (Mei & Jonathan meet)  
2033- 81 (Mission to go to other reality)  
2037- 85 (Epilogue)

Sam/John (this reality)  
2008- 41 (Mei arrived in this reality)  
2021- 54 (Mei & Jonathan meet)  
2033- 66 (Mission to go to other reality)  
2037- 70 (Epilogue)

Sam/John (alternate reality)  
2010- 43 (Mei born)  
2014- 47 (Sam dies)  
2019- 52 (Mei sent away, arrival of 2033 mission)  
2037- 56 (Epilogue)

Laura Cadman (this reality)**  
2008- 27 (Mei arrived in this reality)  
2037- 56 (Epilogue)  
**I am basing her age on personal opinion  
given her appearance and rank in "Duet"


	4. Chapter 4

This story goes back and forth between time lines. An age/year chart is located at the end of each section for clarification.

---------------------------------------------  
_Two years ago -- 2031_

Mei was flitting around their hotel room talking to herself. Most of the phrases Jonathan caught as he was stretched out watching a hockey game on television were along the lines of, "I don't even know why I came to this stupid reunion."

It was her ten-year college reunion and Mei was now stressing out over it.

He glanced at the clock and sat up chuckling to himself. She had worked herself up into a frenzy as she did her hair and makeup.

Jonathan got dressed in his suit and was working on his tie when he heard her say, "Oh, for crying out loud, they're going to think I hired a male escort."

He turned to face her and teased, "Should I be insulted?"

She was back to her normal impish self for a moment and she replied as she adjusted his tie, "No. But no man should look this good in a suit, it's _very_ distracting."

He laughed and shook his head. Seeing that her dress wasn't zipped up in back he stepped around her and deftly slid the zipper up and closed the hook and eye at the top. Some things a man just never forgot how to do no matter how long ago he learned to do them.

---------------

They suffered through the cocktail hour and the stream of people sharing news of their careers and pictures of their children. They made it through dinner and when the band started, Jonathan rescued her from the hordes by pulling her out onto the dance floor.

There was a smile on her face, a fake one he could tell, and there was a brittleness around her eyes. He tried to make her laugh for real by saying, "We could always sneak back up to our room. If anyone asks why we're leaving, you could just tell them you're paying me by the hour and you want to get your money's worth."

Mei had been lost in her own thoughts and it took a second for what he said to register then she dropped her head and laughed. "You are so bad. How do you always know when I need to laugh?"

With a little shrug and a grin he replied, "Probably because I know you better than anybody else and don't you forget it."

She met his eyes and he could see that he smile on her face was genuine this time. "Yeah, you do. But then again, I've got your number, too."

He pulled her in closer and they danced slowly. One song turned into another and Mei was reluctant to leave the dance floor and go back to interacting with the rest of the reunion crowd. Jonathan asked quietly, "Gonna tell me what's bothering you?"

She sighed replied, "They've all got things to share with everyone. I don't. They can talk about their careers and whip out the wedding pictures and pictures of their kids. I can't. I'm back to being that geeky bookworm that had no life in college."

"Yeah. That's about what I figured. The whole work thing never gets any easier unfortunately, it's just the nature of the classified beast. But that other part is something you _can_ fix. My offer still stands you know."

Her brow furrowed as she thought back to the previous summer.

---------------

"Wow, nice house," Mei said as they pulled in the driveway. Nestled in the middle of the wooded property was a large post and beam house.

"Yeah. Grayson did most of the work himself."

"Must have been hard for the Colonel and his wife to leave it when he got reassigned to California."

"Big time. I guess they're listing it with a realtor next week."

"So why are we here?"

"Grayson just asked me to keep an eye on the house until it's sold. And in exchange, we get to use the pool and his amazing stone barbecue."

"Ahhh, so that explains why you told me to bring my bathing suit."

He wagged his eyebrows suggestively, "Unless you want to go skinny dipping. Which, for the record, I have absolutely no problem with." In reality, Jonathan knew that Mei adored the beach and the sun, but hadn't spent a lot of time in a bathing suit since receiving the scars on her back; she was just too self-conscious.

The house, although empty, still had the feeling of being a home. The backyard was beautifully landscaped with a slate patio that wrapped around the in-ground pool. It was quiet and peaceful, and private.

They spent the day enjoying the pool and the sun and just the opportunity to be together in a relaxed setting. As the day wore down Mei was wandering the back yard admiring some of the flowering plants when Jonathan came up behind her and slipped his arms around her waist. She leaned back against him and said, "This was fun."

"Mmm, it'd be great to come home to this everyday."

"Yeah, it would."

He nudged her to turn around and he took hold of both her hands and said, "We could you know."

Mei noticed a little waver in his hands and there was something in his eyes that she couldn't quite decipher. "Could what?"

"Live here. Together. We could buy it."

"You want to buy a house together?"

"Yeah... but that's not all I want. I want to marry you. And I want a family with you."

"Jonathan, we talked about this. I don't want to get married. You know that. I have to find my father. And I can't do that and be someone's wife and mother. Please... if you love me you have to respect that."

She saw the familiar shutters close off the emotions in his eyes but his voice was a little sad as he replied, "I know. I _know_. And I do respect it, I do. Sometimes I just wish we had something that... connected us, you know. Something that was ours, together."

Mei reached up and stroked his cheek gently and said, "Jonathan, if we got any more connected it would take an entire case of C-4 to separate us. But I understand what you're saying. And maybe... maybe we _should_ get a place together and get rid of the separate apartments. Someplace with room for all our books and a place to work and a big honking king-sized bed. You really like this house?"

"I really like this house."

"Then let's buy it."

"Yeah?"

"Yeah," she said with a smile.

They packed up their stuff and were walking back out to the truck when Mei tugged on his hand to stop in the middle of the driveway. "Jonathan, about the other thing...."

"I'm sorry. I shouldn't have brought it up again."

"You don't need to apologize. Look, I'm not saying no forever, just not right now. We're so close to being able to go back for my father. After that... I don't know. Does that make any sense?"

He leaned in and kissed her forehead and said, "It does. But I want you to remember that it's an open ended offer, _whenever_ you're ready."

---------------

The music ended and Mei sighed and chided, "Jonathan."

He smiled gently and asked, "So it's still a no then?"

She wrapped her arms around his waist under his jacket and gave him a squeeze, not caring what anyone else at the reunion thought. As she hugged him she said, "Jonathan?"

He pressed his cheek to her hair and replied, "Yeah?"

"Don't ever stop asking, okay?"

"Didn't plan on it."

---------------------------------------------  
_'Lantis -- Day 179_

Jonathan found Mei sound asleep at a computer terminal with the morning sun streaming into the room. She must have pulled an all-nighter. He chuckled and carefully picked her up and started heading for her quarters to put her to bed.

Mei roused a little and asked, "What are you doing, I was working."

"You were sleeping and maybe even drooling a little, but you definitely were not working. So I'm taking you to bed."

She snuggled her face near his neck and said, "Hmmm, bed. Good idea. Yours or mine?"

He chuckled and said, "Yours, and all by your lonesome I might add. I've got a full day of triple checking all my circuits now that the rewiring is done."

Jonathan tucked her into her bed and gave her a quick kiss before turning to go. Mei squirmed and got comfortable and said sleepily as he reached the door, "Love you."

He paused and looked at her and smiled. She was already out cold.

---------------

_"One suggested she go to bed hours ago. One was ignored."_

Jonathan chuckled and patted the wall as he walked down the corridor. "Don't take it personally. She doesn't listen to me either."

_"You care for her well being."_

"Yes. Very much so. But so do you and a bunch of other folks too."

_"One wishes her to be happy, as she was as a child."_

"Atlantis, children have an innocence that... changes as we grow up and get older. Mei _is_ happy. As happy as I've ever seen her in all the years I've known her."

_"One heard your conversations with Sheppard. It was never One's intention that she forfeit a normal life and happiness in the alternate reality where One sent her to search for a means to simply return here."_

"I know, Atlantis. I know. It wasn't your fault. It wasn't anyone's fault."

_"One comprehends."_

---------------

Jonathan was on his back under a console redoing a circuit that wasn't responding properly when Atlantis stated, _"You feel you are already wed to Mei."_

He dropped the tool he was using onto his chest and scrubbed his face with his hands. "It's complicated, Atlantis."

_"A yes or no answer will be sufficient. In your mind she is your wife, correct?"_

He sighed and answered, "Yes."

_"Yet she will not, by your customs, wed you."_

"No. I've asked. But she hasn't said yes yet."

_"Why does she refuse?"_

"I think partly because she didn't want anything to distract her from getting you home. And then there's the part where I screwed up."

_"What error did you commit?"_

"She thinks that I see her as some sort of substitute for her mother, and that I see Sam when I look at her."

_"That is illogical. Mei is an amalgam of John Sheppard and Samantha Carter. She, unlike you, is not a clone. Her appearance is unique and not a duplicate of her mother. No one should logically mistake the two."_

"Logically, no. In moments of pure stupidity, yes. I've done it twice. But in my own defense I wasn't exactly clear headed either time."

---------------------------------------------  
_One year ago -- 2032_

The dust settled and Mei slowly roused to consciousness. The entire tunnel and cave opening that they had been exploring had collapsed. There was a little light coming from further down the tunnel that seemed to be reaching the tunnel through a fissure in the mountainside.

Mei did an internal check of herself. Nothing felt broken outside of the lump on the side of her head from where Jonathan practically threw her further into the tunnel when the cave had first started to collapse. She sat up and looked around in the dim light for Jonathan. With a cry she saw him lying unconscious with some suitcase-sized boulders pinning his left side.

She quickly went to his side and moved the boulders off of him. "Jonathan. Wake up, Jonathan. Wake up." His left leg was definitely broken. And his left wrist was questionable. She was more worried about internal injuries and bleeding though, but she needed him to wake up to determine if he had any.

With a low moan he opened his eyes. When he tried to move to sit up Mei's hand on him kept him prone. "Easy. Your leg is broken and I'm pretty sure your wrist is too. Can you breathe okay? I couldn't tell if your ribs are broken, but you took a heavy hit with a falling rock."

He could definitely feel the broken leg and wrist and he took a tentative deep breath and found out immediately that at least one or two of his ribs were broken. He let the breath out slowly and whispered, "That would be an affirmative on the broken ribs. You okay?"

"Yeah. I got a little bump on the head when you pushed me out of the way but other than that I'm okay. I'm not getting anything on the radio but static. I think the mountain's electromagnetic properties that we detected earlier are interfering with the radio signal. But once we miss check in, they'll come looking for us. We've got water and there's a fissure up ahead letting in light and plenty of air."

"Okay. So we wait."

"Yeah. But I think I should wrap your ribs and splint that leg the best I can."

He groaned and said, "How did I know you were going to say that?"

Her brow was furrowed with worry and she said, "I've got three doses of morphine in my pack. We'll give you one before I do anything, okay? It'll help."

Even with the morphine the pain was excruciating. When it was done he was lying back down and gasping. He managed to get out, "You're better at that than your mother," before he passed out.

Mei was confused and made a mental note to ask him what he meant when he regained consciousness.

---------------

The light in the fissure faded as the sun set outside. And the temperature also started dropping in the tunnel. There had been no indication from the outside that anyone knew they were alive beyond the collapsed section of the tunnel.

Jonathan was in bad shape and Mei suspected that he had internal injuries beyond the broken ribs. The thin, silvery emergency blankets in their day packs didn't provide much warmth, but she got them both underneath them and had lain as close to Jonathan as she could to keep him warm.

She was falling into a doze when she heard a weak whisper from Jonathan, "It's my sidearm, I swear."

Mei leaned up on her elbow. "Jonathan?"

He didn't reply and she found his forehead in the dark with her hand, he was burning up. She found her flashlight and took a good look at him. He was flushed with fever but had an underlying greyish pallor. He wasn't doing well.

She tried to stow away her panic and said, "Jonathan, you have to stay with me. Do you hear me? You stay with me. They're coming for us."

Mei didn't sleep the rest of the night.

---------------

The next morning the sun through the fissure once again illuminated the tunnel. Mei managed to get Jonathan to drink a little water but he wasn't lucid and was barely conscious. She left him for a few minutes to investigate the fissure. The widest part was only a foot or so wide, not even close to being big enough for her to get through.

Even though he was completely out of it Mei gave him report on their situation as she sat beside him. "I can't make it through that fissure. And there are several branches off this tunnel but there isn't any light that I can see and there's no air movement. I think we're just going to have to wait for them to find us."

She saw his mouth move in response but didn't catch what he said and asked, "Jonathan?"

He licked his dry lips and whispered, "It's time to go to plan B."

"And what exactly is plan B?"

"You take the rest of the supplies and climb out of here. Take your chances up on the planet, head towards daylight."

Mei's expression was that of total confusion. She managed to get out, "What are you talking about?" before he lost consciousness again. But she mulled his words over as she sat beside him; it just made no sense.

---------------

A couple of hours later Mei was contemplating the pros and cons of using their C-4 to widen the fissure. Jonathan was still feverish she tried to get him to drink a little more. She wiped his brow and whispered, "I'm sorry I haven't gotten you out of here yet."

His reply was hoarse and whispered, "Not your fault."

"They should have come for us by now. I don't understand why they haven't."

"Captain, plan B, go."

"What? Jonathan...."

"Sam, I'm dying. Follow my order, please."

Mei was so poleaxed at his words that she almost missed the rhythmic tapping sound coming from the rock pile blocking the entrance. For the second time since she'd known him, he called her Sam.

The insistent tapping finally got her attention and she quickly responded in kind. The rest of their team had finally found them.

She went back over to Jonathan, not quite sure exactly what to think or feel, and saw his feverish cold shivering start up again. Without hesitation, she crawled underneath the emergency blanket with him and held him as tightly as she dared.

If Jonathan calling her Sam had surprised her, what would come out of his mouth next simply turned her entire understanding of him upside down and inside out.

His hand latched onto hers and he held it tightly to his chest, and through chattering teeth he whispered, "Sara...."

---------------

Jonathan was safe and sound in the infirmary. His leg was in traction, his wrist cast, and he had had emergency surgery to repair a near ruptured spleen and some other internal bleeding. He had a fairly long haul to complete recovery, but recover he would.

Once she was satisfied that he was going to be okay, Mei sequestered herself in her lab and tried to sort out her thoughts and emotions. And it wasn't working. Finally she called the one person she hoped might help her make sense of any of it: Sam.

---------------

Sam sat across from Mei at the kitchen table, a cup of coffee in hand as she listened to an obviously upset Mei explain about what had happened in the cave-in.

"Deja vu," Sam commented.

"What? What am I missing?"

"That sounds identical to things Jack said to me when we were trapped down in Antarctica. Literally word for word. Jonathan must have been, I don't know, flashing back I guess."

"He called you Sara?"

A little flash of an old hurt crossed Sam's face and she answered, "Yeah..." and explained the whole thing.

Mei sighed, "I guess I can forgive him this time under the circumstances."

Sam raised and eyebrow and asked, "This time?"

Mei sighed again and replied, "He called me Sam once before."

"When?"

"It was a long time ago. It doesn't matter."

"Apparently it does if this is bothering you enough for you to call me and have me come down here."

"You can't ever say anything about this to him or Uncle Jack. You have to promise me."

"I promise. What happened?"

Mei could, even after all the years, still see Jonathan lying on his back in his rumpled bed in a post-coital, boneless lump. She had leaned up on her elbow next to him and had gently traced his mouth with her finger before leaning in to kiss him, and just as her mouth was a hair's breath away from his, he had reached up and stroked her cheek and breathed out softly, "Sam...."

Sam winced as Mei told the story. But then her mind quickly added up a few things and she asked, "Wait, this was _before_ Christopher?

"Yeah."

"But I thought Christopher was your first..." Sam let the thought trail off.

"No. You sort of assumed, Mom, and it was easier than explaining the truth."

"Yeah. Apparently you forgave Jonathan somewhere along the way though. So why is this still bothering you after all these years?"

"He wants to marry me."

"Really?" Sam replied excitedly with a wide smile. But seeing the doubtful expression on Mei's face asked, "And want do _you_ want?"

"There's a part of me thinks I've already been married to him for about a decade. But then there's this other part that is scared to death that I'm just some sort of available substitute for the person he really wants to be with, and that's the part that wins out."

Sam sipped her coffee and thought for moment. "Mei, how much do you know about the type of black ops training that Jack and ergo Jonathan received?"

"Not much. And we don't talk a lot about his memories before the split."

"Okay. Here's the thing..." Sam explained all the techniques that Jack/Jonathan had had ingrained into them to withstand enemy interrogation and torture.

"So what? You're saying he imprinted on Sara, then you? Like a duckling?"

Sam laughed, "In a way. They need to have something in their mind that they can escape to, for some it's a place, for others it's a person. It took me a while after that misadventure in Antarctica to understand that. For Jack it was Sara initially. Then it became me somewhere along the line I guess."

Mei fiddled with her cup and tried to digest what Sam was saying. Sam reached over and put her hand on top of Mei's and said gently, "And for Jonathan it's you."

Mei's eyes were sad as she met Sam's and asked, "How can you be so sure?"

Sam smiled and said, "Because he called _me_ Mei...."

---------------

Jonathan woke up and felt someone holding his hand. He looked over and saw Mei and smiled. She hadn't been by the infirmary much and he had a suspicion that he had once again done something stupid that she wasn't sharing with him.

His voice was low as he squeezed her hand and asked, "Gonna tell me what I did this time?"

Mei had a bemused look on her face and she reached over with her free hand to brush his hair out of his eyes. "Let's just say you're a duckling."

"Huh?"

She shook her head and said lightly, "You had a little flashback to an old Antarctic adventure while we were in the cave. You called me Sam... and Sara."

Jonathan closed his eyes and dropped his chin to his chest and said, "Just shoot me."

---------------------------------------------  
_'Lantis -- Day 198_

They were assembled in the dining area having what would be their last working lunch in this reality. All systems were a go to return the next day.

Mei, Jonathan, and John were lingering over another cup of coffee after the rest of the team had left and Jonathan was frowning at his tablet.

Mei asked, "What's wrong?"

"There's a small power drain in one of the labs we're not using. I could have sworn that lab was completely shut down when I made my initial sweeps months ago."

John asked, "Which lab?"

Jonathan handed John the tablet and he and Mei watched as John visibly paled. He quickly got up and they heard him address the city, "What have you _done_?"

Mei glanced quickly at the tablet and her shock matched John's and she said, "C'mon. That's the lab were I was made, it was supposed to have been permanently shut down years ago."

---------------

When they arrived at the lab they found that Atlantis wouldn't open the door for John, no matter how much yelling he was doing.

Mei put a calming hand on her father's arm and said, "'Lantis, please open the door."

The city was silent, but complied and the three cautiously entered the lab.

John knew what to expect but seeing it again was altogether different. The large clear tank illuminated in the center of the room was the incubator where they had found Mei. As they approached it now, they saw not just one, but two, developing infants floating safely in it.

"'Lantis, what have you done?"

The city steadfastly refused to answer Mei.

Jonathan had a sneaking suspicion that he wanted an answer to however and asked, "Atlantis, who...?"

_"Vestri,"_ came the city's one word answer.

Mei thought for a moment and clarified, "Yours."

_"Mine?"_ Jonathan asked in disbelief.

John swallowed hard and asked the city the question all three of them already knew the answer to, "Atlantis, whose DNA did you use this time?"

_"Mei and the Anomaly's."_

Jonathan's hand reached out to the tank of its own accord. The smooth surface was warm under his fingers. Those were his children in there. His and Mei's. Jonathan's face took on a horrified look of awe as he thought more about that.

Mei was standing beside him trying not to hyperventilate and pleaded with Jonathan, "Please tell me you didn't put her up to this."

Jonathan ripped his eyes away from the tank and met hers. "What? How could you even think that?"

"I just... I know how badly you want children," the tears that had welled in her eyes flowed freely as she continued, "Tell me you didn't ask her to do this. Not now. We're almost home."

Jonathan simply pulled her into his arms and cradled her head, "I didn't ask her, baby, I promise. Yeah, I want a family. And I want that family with _you_, but not this way."

John went to the control panel and checked the readouts there. He cleared his throat and once he had their attention he said, "Looks like this was initiated about three months ago," he looked at the ceiling and asked, "Am I right, Atlantis?"

"_Yes_."

Mei asked the city sadly, "'Lantis, why did you do this?"

_"When One discovered the scars on your back and how they were obtained, One realized that you could expire without reproducing. That is unacceptable. One took steps to correct that possibility."_

It was Jonathan that asked, "Why are there... two, Atlantis?"

_"Unlike Carter and Sheppard, One could not determine which gender offspring you would prefer and as such, One created an offspring of each gender."_

John looked at Mei and Jonathan, all three sharing the same disbelief. He shrugged and said flatly, "Congratulations. You're having twins."

---------------

They were all a little shell-shocked when they left the lab. Mei's concern was how the power drain from the lab was going to affect the trip home the next day and she and Jonathan were going to run some simulations to see.

Atlantis was silent.

---------------

Mei and Jonathan worked efficiently to complete their simulations. Mei said quietly, "I'm sorry."

Jonathan looked over and said, "For what?"

"Thinking you asked Atlantis to do that. I know you would never do that. I don't know why I said it."

He reached over and took her hand and replied gently, "Mei, you've been working towards this moment since you've been nine years old. I _know_ what you've given up to get here, remember? And I also know how tightly wound your emotions are right now. Finding out like that that we've got two children growing in an incubator was not exactly stress either of us needed right now and I just happened to be in your blast radius when you blew. You and I have got a lot to talk about. But for now I think we need to see if this stops our countdown for tomorrow or not. Then we go from there. Okay?"

"Okay."

---------------

The lab's power drain had no repercussions in any of the scenarios they simulated. It was decided that the countdown was on as planned. With everything done the team broke up early for the day, everyone wanting some down time to mentally prepare for the momentous task of moving the city across time and realities.

Mei couldn't find Jonathan and asked Atlantis for his location.

_"The Anomaly is with his offspring."_

Mei sighed and headed for the lab.

The lab was dark except for the illumination coming from the tank and it took her a moment to find Jonathan. He was sitting on the floor against the far wall with his arms resting on his bent knees, just staring at the tank. Homer lying by his side, his tongue hanging out of his mouth.

Mei went and sat beside Jonathan and with a little smile he said, "Shhh, just listen."

She gave him a confused look but did as he asked. It only took a second before she heard it. The sound of two heartbeats.

His grin got wider and he said, "That's a beautiful sound."

Mei leaned her head on his shoulder and asked, "What are we going to do?"

He put his arm around her and leaned his head towards hers, "Looks to me like we're going to be parents in about six months."

"Yeah. I guess so."

"Mei, we've never talked about the future past getting this city to our reality. But once that's done, life is still gonna go on. You and me and those babies? We can be a family. We can do all the normal things families do, and still have all this. We _can_ make it work. Together."

"I'm just..." she started to say then stopped.

"Scared. I know. I'll let you in on a little secret- so am I."

---------------

The next morning their countdown began. Everyone held their breath as John used the control chair to lift Atlantis from the ocean and up into a particular orbit. A satellite beacon was released to remain in orbit after the city left that contained detailed information about the plague and its cure just in case anyone came looking.

Next, a series of ten large buoys was released to form a large orbiting circle. Jonathan freely admitted that he shamelessly stole the idea from the Ori and modified it for their needs.

Everything was in place, and all that was left was to initiate the process itself. Before they did that, Mei took a moment to address the team.

"Regardless of how this turns out on the other side, I just wanted to personally thank you all for volunteering to come on this mission. I couldn't have asked for a better team to make this happen."

John had joined them in the control room and Mei met his eyes briefly before asking the city, "'Lantis, are you ready?"

_"Affirmative. Calculations are complete, initiating process."_

The city started pulling power from every corner and pushed it to the new specially designed transfer station out on the foremost pier. The transfer station funneled that power into a device at the top, which in turn converted all of that siphoned energy into a beam that fired towards the top buoy in the floating circle. It seemingly just absorbed the beam for a moment before two similar beams shot out of its sides to the buoys on either side of it starting a chain reaction. It took about ten minutes for all of the buoys to be charged, and once the last one had an adequate charge Atlantis halted the beam from the pier. Everyone in the control room held their breath and didn't release it until the familiar sight of a wormhole backwash filled the view in front of them. For all intents and purposes, it looked like a simple wormhole that formed out there among the floating buoys, but it was anything but simple.

_"Event is stable. Proceed or abort?"_

Mei and Jonathan were side by side, checking readings. She looked sideways at him and he teased with a grin, "Now or never."

She nudged him with her elbow playfully and said to the city, "Proceed 'Lantis. Let's go home."

The city fired a small burst of the maneuvering thrusters that sent itself gently through the event horizon before them.

---------------

Seconds later the city reappeared through a second set of floating buoys. A moment after they appeared a familiar voice came from the communications system, "Hail, Dorothy, I see you found your Emerald City."

A cheer went up in the control rooms of both cities and Mei replied, "Yes, I did, Uncle Jack. It's good to be home. Initiating splash-down."

---------------

Once the city was safely settled on the ocean and was slowly maneuvering to meet up with the other Atlantis, Mei slipped out of the control room without a word to anyone. Jonathan found her in the lab, standing in front of the incubator.

He stepped up beside her and placed a gentle hand on her back and said lightly, "Hey."

She turned towards him with an odd, peaceful smile on her face and replied, "Hi."

"You okay?"

"Yeah, just... thinking. It's been sort of a big day."

"That's an understatement. You did it, Mei. You got your dad _and_ the city home, safe and sound."

The odd, thoughtful look was back on her face as she replied, "No, Jonathan. _ We_ did it. I would never have been able to make this happen without you."

He shrugged and replied, "I don't know about that. There are better engineers than me."

She nudged his elbow and said, "That's not what I meant and you know it. All these years you've been right beside me. Even when I push you away you always come back."

"Yeah, well...."

She turned back towards the incubator and placed a hand on the tank.

_"One transmits your bio-signals to the offspring when you touch the incubator."_

"So they know we're here?"

_"Yes. It builds a bond between you and the offspring not dissimilar to that of an offspring in its mother's womb. _

"Interesting," Jonathan said as he placed his own hand on the tank next to Mei's.

_"Sheppard spent many hours bonding with Mei as she developed."_

Mei smiled, "I didn't know that."

Jonathan said lightly, "He's a good dad."

A quiet moment stretched out in the room and the city filled it with the sounds of the infants' heartbeats.

Mei dropped her head to Jonathan's shoulder and said softly, "You're going to be an awesome dad, Jonathan." She turned her head a little to look up at him and added, "And a great husband, too."

He met her eyes and grinned. "Just so we're clear. This is your version of finally saying yes?"

She playfully blew her bangs out of her eyes with exaggerated exasperation and teased, "Yep."

He had seen that before, and her actions were all Carter. Then he realized that no, they weren't. They were all _Mei_.

---------------------------------------------  
_Epilogue -- 2037_

"Grampa, watch me!" a little voice piped up from near the pool.

Three sets of eyes turned to see the little boy jump fearlessly into the pond as he tried to make as big a splash as he could.

It was the Fourth of July and everyone was gathered at Jack's cabin for a family gathering. It was work to bundle up the two exuberant four-year olds and truck them from their home in Pegasus all the way to Earth and Minnesota, not to mention that they left a sulking sentient city behind when they did it. But, although it was never discussed out loud, everyone knew that Jack was eight-six years old and though his health was excellent, they needed to let the children spend as much time with their Grampa Jack as they could manage before the inevitable happened.

It was an odd sort of gathering. Jack and Sam were there obviously, as were Mei, Jonathan, and the twins. It was the three other Pegasus visitors that made it an odd tableau.

The older John Sheppard, from this reality, had finally accepted his first invitation to the cabin and was enjoying the fresh air and tranquility as he spent time with his family. He had never married; his job and protecting Atlantis had taken priority. He had settled almost happily into the role of "Grampa" though and was enjoying watching the twins grow up and being part of their lives.

The younger John Sheppard had been to the cabin before; he had enthusiastically accepted when he first arrived in this reality, and Jack had shared photo albums, home movies, and lots of stories about Mei growing up. He was glad to see that Mei had a fairly normal childhood thanks to Jack. Sam had made sure that Mei had had challenging schools and scholastic opportunities, but Jack had made her just be a kid. She had a well-rounded upbringing and John couldn't have been happier. He was still mentally adjusting to the idea of going from being a dad to a nine-year old to being "Grampa" but he adored his grandchildren and the longer he knew Jonathan, the more he liked him and John couldn't have asked for a better man to marry his daughter or to count as a friend.

The third visitor was a surprise to everyone. Well, everyone except Mei, she had seen it coming even if no one else had.

---------------

Colonel Laura Cadman had retired to Atlantis a year after the arrival of the second city. That privilege was granted only to those Atlantis personnel that had lived through the war with the Wraith, they had more than earned it. She had requested to be housed on the second city and the request had been granted without hesitation.

John had been on his morning run when someone fell into step beside him. He looked over and it took him a moment to recognize Laura. The fact that everyone here was almost fifteen years older still threw him for a loop occasionally. This was one of those times. The woman jogging effortlessly next to him wasn't the younger, married major from his reality. This Laura was now his age. She was still cocky and confident but now with a maturity that only time brought.

They became friends. Laura had also gotten married in this reality, and divorced. The war with the Wraith had left its mark on her and her Earth-side husband just couldn't understand. She told John that she had wanted to be with someone that understood, that had been there, but she also didn't want to try dating anyone that she had served with, it was just too weird. So instead, she had thrown herself back into her career after that and hadn't remarried or had a family.

Folks around both cities thought that the friendship that had sprung up between the two of them was a little odd; no one could remember _their_ Sheppard being that friendly with Cadman. Mei saw something that the rest of them didn't though, that being that her father wasn't alone and that made it perfectly okay in her book.

Laura had slowly became a part of their little family over the past couple of years. And as things often do, their relationship evolved into more than friendship. They kept it under wraps, not wanting it to become scuttlebutt fodder, but of course 'Lantis knew which in turn meant Mei knew.

When the plans for the Fourth of July started being made, John surprised them all by asking Jack if he minded if John brought a guest along.

---------------

They were all sitting down to eat, Jonathan had, with running commentary from Jack, successfully charred enough food on the grill to feed everyone. The twins were happily sitting over at their own kid-sized picnic table with its very own umbrella that Jack had insisted that they needed, eating their hotdogs. Mei and Jonathan both seemed to be anxious about something, and had been since before they left Atlantis.

Jonathan met her eyes across the picnic table and said lightly, "Sullivan's coming over to our cabin tomorrow to give us an estimate on an addition."

Jack raised an eyebrow and asked, "An addition? What for?"

Jonathan tried for casual, "Just looking for a little more space inside."

Jack passed the potato salad and replied, "There's just the four of you, how much more space do you need?"

Jonathan grinned and said to Mei, "You wanna tell them or should I?"

Mei bit her lip then said, "We're having another baby."

Sam's eyes grew wide and she worriedly asked, "I thought that lab in Atlantis was permanently shut down?"

Jonathan almost spewed the beer he had just sipped when Mei said with a beaming smile, "It was. We sorta did this one the old fashioned way."

The congratulations went around the table. Jack was the oddly quiet one. When Jonathan's eyes met his, one side of Jack's mouth quirked up and he nodded once. No one save the two men would ever know what actually passed between the two men in that silent moment. They had come full circle, Jack's life nearing its end and Jonathan's just truly beginning. And it was in that moment that they both finally accepted both of those things.

---------------

Back in Pegasus, 'Lantis waited.

She waited for her Sheppard to return home.

And she waited for the twins.

But most of all, she waited for Mei... and the Anomaly.

---------------------------------------------  
the end.

_Age table for those interested:_

Mei

2008- 09 (Mei arrived in this reality)  
2021- 22 (Mei & Jonathan meet)  
2033- 34 (Mission to go to other reality)  
2037- 38 (Epilogue)

Jonathan (physical age)

2003- 15 (Jonathan created by Loki)  
2021- 33 (Mei & Jonathan meet)  
2033- 45 (Mission to go to other reality)  
2037- 49 (Epilogue)

Jack  
2003- 51 (Jonathan created by Loki)  
2008- 56 (Mei arrived in this reality)  
2021- 69 (Mei & Jonathan meet)  
2033- 81 (Mission to go to other reality)  
2037- 85 (Epilogue)

Sam/John (this reality)  
2008- 41 (Mei arrived in this reality)  
2021- 54 (Mei & Jonathan meet)  
2033- 66 (Mission to go to other reality)  
2037- 70 (Epilogue)

Sam/John (alternate reality)  
2010- 43 (Mei born)  
2014- 47 (Sam dies)  
2019- 52 (Mei sent away, arrival of 2033 mission)  
2037- 56 (Epilogue)

Laura Cadman (this reality)**  
2008- 27 (Mei arrived in this reality)  
2037- 56 (Epilogue)  
**I am basing her age on personal opinion  
given her appearance and rank in "Duet"


End file.
